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A comment on The Overfitted Brain: Dreams evolved to assist generalization. Parent comment

Re:The Overfitted Brain: Dreams evolved to assist generaliza... by maps7 on Sunday July 26, 2020 @11:19AM (#23957662)
The answer I got from Matt Walker's "Why We Sleep?" was a list of benefits that we get from sleep and a list of negatives that we avoid. That is a sufficient answer for me. To ask why we need those benefits is a different question and eventually goes down a philosophical path.
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Re:The Overfitted Brain: Dreams evolved to assist generaliza... by mytailorisrich on Sunday July 26, 2020 @11:44AM (#23957905)
Personally, I think that most behaviours/attributes have evolved out of the basic laws of life (survive and reproduce) and of Physics, especially energy-related constraints. Based on that the most obvious basis for sleep is energy saving.

I believe that 'sleep' has been observed in animals as simple as jellyfish so any neuroscience-centred explanation is bound to miss the root cause, in my view. But, as often in evolution, the development of nervous systems may have taken advantage of pre-existing sleep patterns.

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Re:The Overfitted Brain: Dreams evolved to assist generaliza... by andyljones on Sunday July 26, 2020 @01:47PM (#23958754)
'Why We Sleep' has some, uh, issues on the benefits-and-negatives front too.

https://guzey.com/books/why-we-sleep

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Re:The Overfitted Brain: Dreams evolved to assist generaliza... by maps7 on Sunday July 26, 2020 @05:31PM (#23960338)
Thanks for posting - it's always good to see all views. It's disappointing because the book helped me a lot. It helped me understand sleep and how I should change my lifestyle to get more of it. I feel (no measure) that it has benefited me.

I will not regard it as scientifically accurate now though.

Does anyone have any other books about sleep that they could recommend?

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