Study shows how taking short breaks may help our brains learn new skills

Re:Study shows how taking short breaks may help our brains l... by kevinkeller on Wednesday June 09, 2021 @03:04AM (#27445092)

I too read Why We Sleep, and found it quite interesting. Then I found out that there is some controversy regarding its claims.

Previous discussions on HN:

* https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21546850

* https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26684519

TBH I haven't made up my mind about the book yet, just thought you should know about these things too.

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Re:Study shows how taking short breaks may help our brains l... by float4 on Wednesday June 09, 2021 @06:49AM (#27446437)

People complain about his book a lot, as is their right, but the finger tapping experiment was actually conducted by Walker's team and the scientific paper[0] has been cited over 500 times.

[0] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC202318/

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Re:Study shows how taking short breaks may help our brains l... by sidm83 on Wednesday June 09, 2021 @10:03PM (#27455918)

I found these critiques soon after reading the book. However, there are many other researches cited in the book and I would take them on face value for the not very scientific but somewhat valid (for me) reason of personal experience.

I got into the habit of all night slogs right since high school and it persisted till recently due to the pressure of sticking to deadlines. So I could relate well to several experiments cited in the book.

Considering we do not know nearly as much as we ought to know yet, I would rather err on the side of caution and give far more importance to sleep than I have previously.

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