Sometimes I like to question why evolution made humans the way we are. Particularly during the school year when it seems like there is so much to be done, I wonder why evolution wanted us to sleep for 8 hours a day, which is the equivalent to one-third of our lives. It just seems like a waste of time. Imagine all the things we as a civilization could achieve with 30% more time. I posed this question to my parents, and they told me that sleep is when the body repairs itself. When I asked my sisters, one of them told me that humans on average actually sleep less than the majority of other primates. So I suppose that while 8 hours is still a lot, it is less time spent asleep than other similar animals. During the insomnia plague in 100 Hundred Years of Solitude, everyone was very productive for a while, but there were unforeseen consequences: people began to forget things. I read a study that stated that lack of sleep is one of the contributing factors to Alzheimer's. When you sleep, some chemical in your brain gets flushed out. If it doesn't get flushed out, it builds up and can lead to Alzheimer's and hence memory loss. So after an internal debate, I have decided that evolution did a decent job in creating humans. No animal can function entirely without sleep, and if I there was a trade off between more active time in my life and actually remembering my life, I suppose I'm fine with the remembering option. After all, experiencing something but not remembering it doesn't seem so great (though I suppose in our fundamental years there are a ton of memories we don't remember but formed us to who we are today).
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When I was the most sick from COVID, that is when I needed the most sleep. It became all that I did each day. When I woke up, I would get something to eat, then I would go back to sleep. I think that sleep is not just a method of healing, but it is also a way to recover what you have already lost. Memory and sleep also go hand and hand, not just because of Alzheimer's, but also because if you sleep too much, then you miss out on making those important memories with your friends. Just because sleep is healthy does not mean that you should sleep your days away. Too much sleep is just as dangerous because Alzheimer's can only take away the memories that you make.
That is an interesting statement, Renee. Both sides produce fairly strong and interesting arguments on sleep. It is true that without sleep you begin to lose your health but at the same time is it worth it to be healthy with no memories? I was learning about Mr. Rogers who claimed that he slept most of his later years, not due to illness or old age but because he said he personally felt that the more sleep he had the better his person was. The question of memories seemed to be an afterthought in comparison to his health. I found it interesting but also enlightening in many ways. Mr. Rogers believed that to live a good life you had to become the best version of you, which began with your health which would then allow you to help others. His reasoning behind putting himself first however was not selfish, but beneficial to everyone. Mr. Rogers furhtermorew was known for his generousnature, working on PBS to educate children, writing childrens books, donating numerous relief funds including Hurricane Katrina. So getting back to the point raised by Renee, too much sleep is dangerous and so is not enough sleep but neither of those matters compared to what you are doing while you are awake, since sleep after all is just a form of recharging energy.
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