Why do we know so little about sleep when we spend half our lives doing it?

Question

Is there a second reality we dismiss as rem or sleep state? Where does the essence of a person go when they are comatised? There must be more to it than just dreaming/resting. I am aware of the biological shutdown body process, I don't mean that, and I have read about astral travel I don't mean that either. Why the mental not physical need for sleep?

Answer 1

Actually we are dead during our sleep.

Answer 2

Good question. Was gonna comment on astral travel and tell you about the monroe institute and such but it looks like you want an answer to why we need the mental rechrge. I wonder this myself. Having worked very long hours and all nighters to ooften I can pump my body full of caffeine and have a second wind take in but still the mental drag. I think it has to do with energies re-establishing and recoordinated certain communicative frequencies are organs and cells work off of and the chemical release in the brain is hindered to to a fight or flight response therefore stopping neural networks and synapses from fire correctly.

Answer 3

I guess we know so little about sleep because we're always asleep when it's happening.

The obvious answer to 'where does the essence go', is that there's no such thing as an essence of a person. Your consciousness doesn't go anywhere when you sleep, it simply ceases to exist, and a new consciousness is fired up when you awaken. The new consciousness starts with a bank of memories, and so there is the illusion of continuity. But really, for all practical purposes, what you consider 'you' will die tonight when you go to sleep. The 'you' that wakes up tomorrow will be someone else.

Pleasant dreams.

Answer 4

Study of anything related to the brain is a young science. We are just learning about this stuff. Many scientists think that sleep is a way of rehearsing reality or going over the days events to aid learning and memory, turning the mind off to outside senses. Movies and TV have put this process out of whack by inducing false dreams -- dreaming about things that you see but haven't actually happened to you.

- There is no second reality, sleep has brainwave patterns we can recognize
- Comatose patients aren't really "asleep", they are just unconscious.

Answer 5

Read a book about sleep... we know quite a bit more than you think.

Answer 6

It has to do with our evolutionary past. There is alot of great information on sleep.

Answer 7

God study sleepology.

Answer 8

Cause when we are 'doing it' we are unconscience