If You Could Eliminate the Need to Sleep, Would You?

[Hygro]

Does it mean to stay sane we'd still need and be able to dream? So we'd spend a few hours hallucinating wildly while awake?

 

[SoupJuice]

Does it mean to stay sane we'd still need and be able to dream? So we'd spend a few hours hallucinating wildly while awake?

I'm glad my dream content sticks to my dreams.

 

[Hygro]

 

[Hojsimpson]

I can have lucid dreams. Sleeping makes me feel good. And I still waste many time while I'm awake.

 

[illram]

Does it mean to stay sane we'd still need and be able to dream? So we'd spend a few hours hallucinating wildly while awake?

No dreaming needed. Whatever biological purpose dreams provide is replaced artificially by the treatment. As Owen said if you wanted to still dream it would be a purely personal preference; there would be no adverse health effects. (Note: some may not consider hallucinating wildly an adverse health effect...)

 

[Narz]

I love sleep & I love dreams but it'd be nice to be able to skip a few nights if I wanted to with no ill effect.

Also, as an insomniac, the occasions where I have work or family obligations that require me to wake up at 7 or 8am are very annoying (since I usually goto bed at 3 or 4am). Being able to turn off the need for sleep for those days/weeks would be very helpful for my mood/alertness/health/productivity.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

I've had some horrible nightmares that have bothered me for decades, but on the whole, I enjoy dreaming and wouldn't want to not be able to have them.

 

[Kyriakos]

No dreaming needed. Whatever biological purpose dreams provide is replaced artificially by the treatment. As Owen said if you wanted to still dream it would be a purely personal preference; there would be no adverse health effects. (Note: some may not consider hallucinating wildly an adverse health effect...)

On a similarly realistic development, i think we should work towards cancelling the need to breathe. I mean i know it is a semi-automatic process and all, but it still seems boring. Besides, there will be more oxygen around if we don't breathe. Which might in turn lead to many of the trees dieing out due to a lot less co2 around, but whatever, i still think we should work towards not breathing

 

[Hygro]

No dreaming needed. Whatever biological purpose dreams provide is replaced artificially by the treatment. As Owen said if you wanted to still dream it would be a purely personal preference; there would be no adverse health effects. (Note: some may not consider hallucinating wildly an adverse health effect...)

Basically your hypothetical, as Terx pointed out, gives us more than the ability to go without sleep but a constant state of peak-mind superpowers. So yeah, that'd be dope. I'm gonna go watch Limitless now if it's on Netflix.

 

[El_Machinae]

The important question is: would it just be 'for me', or 'for everyone'?

"For me" would be such a ginormous advantage. "For everyone" would smooth out that advantage and thus increase net competition. We'd be soon forced to work 16 hour days just to pay the rent, and would speed the rate at which we're becoming inequal. Some hardcore labour laws, though, would make this amazing.

 

[Mise]

Does "no negative health effects" extend to the effect of sleep on creativity/problem solving? "Sleeping on it" really does help with solving problems; a good dream has an uncanny way of connecting the dots. Countless times I've been puzzling over something, only to give up, go to bed, then wake up the next morning with the answer. Part of this might be tiredness, which, if eliminated, might mean that the problem solving benefits of sleep are diminished. But I still wonder to what extent sleep itself, and not merely rest, relaxation, and "taking your mind off things", facilitates problem solving and creativity.

I've also read that sleep helps us embed the things that we've learnt during the day. So if we take in a lot of new information, sleep helps to arrange that information in our brains, digest it, comprehend it, and incorporate it into our total stock of working knowledge.

I answered "yes" to the poll, but losing these things would be a huge disadvantage.

 

[sophie]

On a similarly realistic development, i think we should work towards cancelling the need to breathe. I mean i know it is a semi-automatic process and all, but it still seems boring. Besides, there will be more oxygen around if we don't breathe. Which might in turn lead to many of the trees dieing out due to a lot less co2 around, but whatever, i still think we should work towards not breathing

Remarking on how realistic or unrealistic the hypothetical is also falls against the accepted rules of a hypothetical (it's person #5 in fifty's post). Yes it's unrealistic. Intentionally so. Pointing that out makes you look stupid. The question is not about whether or not this can be achieved, the question is, given no debilitating physical or mental health consequences would you choose not to sleep. Yes or no?

Does "no negative health effects" extend to the effect of sleep on creativity/problem solving? "Sleeping on it" really does help with solving problems; a good dream has an uncanny way of connecting the dots. Countless times I've been puzzling over something, only to give up, go to bed, then wake up the next morning with the answer. Part of this might be tiredness, which, if eliminated, might mean that the problem solving benefits of sleep are diminished. But I still wonder to what extent sleep itself, and not merely rest, relaxation, and "taking your mind off things", facilitates problem solving and creativity.

I don't know what illram is going to say, but personally I'd see that as not falling under negative health effects. The pill makes it so you never feel sleepy, aren't driven insane due to lack of sleep/dreaming, don't die from lack of sleep, and don't suffer a shortened life due to not sleeping for decades. It won't kill you and it won't drive you insane. Things like "enjoying dreaming", "liking the comfort of crawling into bed and drifting off to sleep", "waking up next to another warm person you care about", "suffering from depression/ennui or being driven crazy out of boredom", or "solving a problem by sleeping on it" would fall under reasons to not want to take the pill.

Personally I don't think "solving a problem by sleeping on it" would be reason enough for me to not want to take the pill. "solving a problem by taking a walk" also has been shown in studies to really help with thinking through a problem and tends to be my preferred method right now. The only reason I personally would consider not taking the pill would be for the reason(s) warpus listed. I like falling asleep with the gf in my arms. I like waking up next to her in the morning. Not being able to do that would be really depressing and would really make me think twice about the promise of increased productivity and not having to waste 7-8 hours out of every day in my life doing essentially nothing.

 

[Bugfatty300]

Four to six DAYS? As in four to six times 24 hours?

Sorry, but I don't see how anyone could do that and not end up sick or dead.

Yes. 4 to 6 days. Followed by a a week or two of normal sleep. I don't seem to get sick or dead. Just kind of tired.

 

[El_Machinae]

My brain shut off when I went without sleep for too long. I was safe to drive (apparently), but I have few memories from that period of my life.

 

[Gori the Grey]

People evidently do little micro-sleeps when they go long periods without scheduled sleep; little 20-second nod offs that quickly give some of the benefits of sleep. Were you aware of that happening, Bugfatty?

 

[illram]

Basically your hypothetical, as Terx pointed out, gives us more than the ability to go without sleep but a constant state of peak-mind superpowers. So yeah, that'd be dope. I'm gonna go watch Limitless now if it's on Netflix.

I guess. That depends on whether anything but "tired" is "peak mind" or some state of hyper-awareness. I can be "not tired" and still not concentrating well, just out of boredom or some other mental lapse.

Does "no negative health effects" extend to the effect of sleep on creativity/problem solving? "Sleeping on it" really does help with solving problems; a good dream has an uncanny way of connecting the dots. Countless times I've been puzzling over something, only to give up, go to bed, then wake up the next morning with the answer. Part of this might be tiredness, which, if eliminated, might mean that the problem solving benefits of sleep are diminished. But I still wonder to what extent sleep itself, and not merely rest, relaxation, and "taking your mind off things", facilitates problem solving and creativity.

I've also read that sleep helps us embed the things that we've learnt during the day. So if we take in a lot of new information, sleep helps to arrange that information in our brains, digest it, comprehend it, and incorporate it into our total stock of working knowledge.

I answered "yes" to the poll, but losing these things would be a huge disadvantage.

I have to get sort of hand-wavy for the hypothetical since I am not intimately familiar with the biological/medical science behind sleep. To try and keep this simple, the "no adverse" effects stipulation basically means that whatever biological or chemical regenerative process sleep or dreams provide to your brain is replaced by the treatment. So if there is some cellular regenerative process (provided by dreams or whatever) that stimulates creativity, that would remain. But if you gain some other creative aptitude from dreams divorced from the physical restorative process, e.g. you experience something in your dream that makes you realize some alternative solution to a problem, that will be lost since you will not, of course, dream.

But you can stop the treatment and sleep if you want to dream. I suppose the hypothetical would be more interesting if an added stipulation is that it is irreversible...

 

[Zelig]

Does "no negative health effects" extend to the effect of sleep on creativity/problem solving? "Sleeping on it" really does help with solving problems; a good dream has an uncanny way of connecting the dots. Countless times I've been puzzling over something, only to give up, go to bed, then wake up the next morning with the answer. Part of this might be tiredness, which, if eliminated, might mean that the problem solving benefits of sleep are diminished. But I still wonder to what extent sleep itself, and not merely rest, relaxation, and "taking your mind off things", facilitates problem solving and creativity.

I've also read that sleep helps us embed the things that we've learnt during the day. So if we take in a lot of new information, sleep helps to arrange that information in our brains, digest it, comprehend it, and incorporate it into our total stock of working knowledge.

I answered "yes" to the poll, but losing these things would be a huge disadvantage.

There's a quite lot of benefit to working problems out by taking breaks when not sleeping - but if you always sleep when you're taking breaks from problems, then obviously you're going to associated most of the benefits to sleeping.

 

[pob]

Since last year I've been going 4-6 days in a row without any sleep at all. I just quit feeling sleepy at the end of the day and I've sort of gotten use to it. But as far as I can say, you're really not missing out on much between 00 and 06.

I used to be the same, typically going 5 days with no sleep, and I actually miss it now. The main problem for me was finding some way to be productive with the extra time

 

[Quintillus]

If there were no adverse health effects, then yeah, it would be nice to be able to eliminate the need to sleep. Like Narz said, even though I'd probably still want to sleep just to relax occasionally (like I did last Sunday when I had a bit of a headache, and sure enough, a nap cured it), sometimes it'd be really useful to not have to sleep or be really out of it the next day.

Being able to be both a night owl and morning person would also be pretty cool. Presently, the only times I am able to do that is when I go to sleep around noon, and that really is not feasible most of the time - plus it would be nice to not miss the daytime when doing so.

And being able to stay up all night playing Civ and have no adverse effects the next day? Totally awesome. I just did stay up playing Civ all night, so I'm really glad I don't have anything important to do today, but if I didn't have to sleep at all, that wouldn't be a concern.

 

[Væringjar]

Yes and No.

Yes, because we can do many things in 6-8 hours instead sleeping.
No, because we may have some good dreams and in real life non of us able to those things.