Editing 1345: Answers

{{comic
| number    = 1345
| date      = March 21, 2014
| title     = Answers
| image     = answers.png
| titletext = Stanford sleep researcher William Dement said that after 50 years of studying sleep, the only really solid explanation he knows for why we do it is 'because we get sleepy'.
}}

The primary purpose of sleep may well be brainwashing. Lulu Xie et al. Sleep Drives Metabolite Clearance from the Adult Brain, Science 18 October 2013:  Vol. 342 no. 6156 pp. 373-377.

==Explanation==
[[Cueball]] claims that humans are driven by their curiosity, which is never-ending. [[Megan]] responds by noting that everyone spends approximately eight hours per day in an unconscious state of {{w|sleep}}, but no one has yet pinned down the biological purpose of sleep.  Despite this obvious mystery, most people aren't "losing sleep over it"... This implies that Cueball's observed curiosity has a perceptible and proximate limit.

This is not to suggest that scientists ''aren't'' researching sleep; scientists frequently conduct {{w|Sleep study|sleep studies}} — we just haven't found any satisfactory answers yet. Some popular hypotheses are to allow the brain a period to consolidate memories and to give the body a chance to repair itself.

The title text quotes {{w|William Dement}}: people sleep "because we get sleepy." ([http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2010/05/sleep/max-text Secrets of sleep]).  This of course is dodging the underlying issue. That this non-explanation is the best answer that a leading sleep researcher can provide, shows how little anyone knows about the subject. This may be an oblique reference to the French playwright Moliere [https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/dormitive_principle dormitive principle], who created a satirical character who claimed to have discovered the answer to a popular question: The reason opium makes someone sleepy, said the character, a doctor, was that it contained a "dormitive principle" (i.e., something that makes someone sleepy).

At [[203|Hallucinations]], Randall expressed similar surprise at the lack of interest in the nature of sleep.

The phrase "and nobody knows why" is commonly appended to urban legends, as in [http://www.snopes.com/critters/wild/duckecho.asp A duck's quack doesn't echo, and no one knows why]. The implication is that something mysterious is going on and scientists are puzzled. [[1186: Bumblebees]] is another "nobody knows why" example.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball and Megan are talking.]
:Cueball: Humans are defined by our curiosity, our hunger for answers.
:Megan: We all spend a third of our lives lying down with our eyes closed and '''''NOBODY KNOWS WHY.'''''
:Cueball: Touché.

{{comic discussion}}