Evolution and insomnia

JuliusCaesar

ok....way back when I was a student studying the nature and functions of sleep, one of the theories about sleep was that it was a way of stopping us blundering about in the dark - we were safer if we just conked out.

anyway, I've recently been reading up about those gradual dawn lights as a cure for insomnia. So, people living near the equator have equal nights and days and so have a very regular pattern. Those of us who live above and below a certain latitude (?) have day lengths which vary by season. So we should sleep more in winter (total agreement on this personally!) and less in summer (fine by me!) Unfortunately my employers don't agree, nor do most peoples'. So we get blackout blinds to stop us waking at 5am in summer, and then invest in the artificial dawn light so we don't sleep too long in winter.

Unnatural? You bet your arse it is. Oh well. I guess I'm just having a rant.

slowburner

JuliusCaesar wrote: »

ok....way back when I was a student studying the nature and functions of sleep, one of the theories about sleep was that it was a way of stopping us blundering about in the dark - we were safer if we just conked out.

anyway, I've recently been reading up about those gradual dawn lights as a cure for insomnia. So, people living near the equator have equal nights and days and so have a very regular pattern. Those of us who live above and below a certain latitude (?) have day lengths which vary by season. So we should sleep more in winter (total agreement on this personally!) and less in summer (fine by me!) Unfortunately my employers don't agree, nor do most peoples'. So we get blackout blinds to stop us waking at 5am in summer, and then invest in the artificial dawn light so we don't sleep too long in winter.

Unnatural? You bet your arse it is. Oh well. I guess I'm just having a rant.

Well you might as well rant here rather than at your employers.
Alternatively, you could request that you be allowed to indulge in your new regime - Polyphasic sleep

There is something utterly wrong about getting up at 6 am on a cold wet Monday morning in January - even if you were very well behaved the night before.

This theory that we were safer sleeping rather than fumbling about in the dark - hmmm - I can see the sense of it, but I am not so sure that we are programmed to sleep as soon as it gets dark.
We've had fire for quite a while now and with fire comes light and with light on demand comes a disruption to the diurnal cycle.
And is just after sundown not when most affable social interaction takes place? Is this the time of day when communities are built and reinforced?
It's not hard to imagine though, that being awoken by first light would give the hunter an advantage - not much point in getting up to hunt in the dark.

JuliusCaesar

I'm going to ignore the Polyphasic Sleep in favour of sleeping a lot at weekends.

Yea, fire, twilight, ideal bonding times for grooming and the human equivalent of storytelling. But fire is an expensive resource, so you wouldn't generally keep a blazing fire going till 2am except for special occasions. So I think humans would generally kip down after dark, and wake with early light. (My evidence: I always woke really early when camping.)