That's interesting, do you know what journals the polyphasic sleep studies were done in?  I'd be interested in reading them.

On the sleep cycle time: you are right about the 1.5 hour sleep cycle as far as I remember.  I got thrown off because my natural sleep period is 3 hours (this was found through the "natural length" of a full nap and the sleep time if I decide to "go back to sleep" on a weekend).

On Tue, Aug 11, 2009 at 5:56 PM, Jonathan Vogel < jonathan@friedpancakes.[redacted] > wrote:

It's interesting you have determined that as my research has shown me a normal person's complete sleep cycle is 1.5 hours in which case 3 hours would be two full cycles.

I believe you are misunderstanding the point of polyphasic sleep.  It doesn't work out of the box and actual has a difficult adaptation process.  This is because you must train both your brain and body to compress that 1.5 hour sleep cycle into something smaller which has been (through experimentation) determined to be 20 minutes (on the money).  Besides people with narcolepsy, monophasic sleepers need about 60 minutes to hit REM sleep.  A polyphasic sleeper on the other hand, hits REM sleep within 1-2 minutes.  A lot of people don't believe me, but there have been research studies that show this.  I often experience vivid dreams during my naps.  I never used to remember dreams very much before.
Also to answer your question about why most people sleep monophasically.  I'm pretty sure that's just because it is natural.  It makes sense, doesn't it?  Especially in a world like today.  Polyphasic sleep is *not* practical long-term and there are no only a few documented cases of it lasting in excess of years (mind you the concept of polyphasic sleep is fairly new).

The 1.5 still holds true for Everyman as the Everyman 'core' sleep is always in multiples of 1.5 hours (1.5, 3, or 4.5).  Where 20 minute naps fulfill the remaining multiples of 1.5 hours to get 7.5 hours of sleep.  Uberman eliminates the core sleep and only consists of 20 min naps.  *Note to everyone: *If you read anything about the 'Dymaxion' schedule online, listen to me and ignore it now--it doesn't work.  Trust me.

I hope that sheds some light on the subject.

Jonathan

Alex wrote:

Honestly, my experience with sleep is that I feel most rested and conscious with the longest single stretch of sleep possible.  Though I applaud some people's choice to be test subjects in this regard (thus pushing forward our understanding of sleep) I would like to just throw out a warning:

Given _my_ current understanding of sleep, 20 minute sleep segments won't bring the same benefit as sleep periods broken into something which fits cleanly with your natural full sleep cycle (mine is almost exactly 3 hours).  20 minute sleep periods don't allow for the full depth of sleep that a full cycle will, which as far as I remember translates into significantly reduced rejuvenational benefits from sleep.  Do your own research, but just keep in mind that there _are_ reasons most everyone sleeps during one single period....

Also, I'd be curious to hear the experiences of those who actually do try to pull of polyphasic sleep for more than 14 months.

~Alex Kesling

On Tue, Aug 11, 2009 at 5:19 PM, Jonathan Vogel < jonathan@friedpancakes.[redacted] <mailto: jonathan@friedpancakes.[redacted] >> wrote:

For those who don't know, I'm an adapted polyphaser.  I have been
on the Everyman (3 hour core, 3x20 min naps) schedule for almost 3
months now.  I intend to hold this schedule through at least the
fall semester.

You can find me on on freenode/#ncsulug (jvogel) if you have any
questions.  There is also an active polyphasic sleep IRC channel
#polyphasers which you can find on freenode.

Although I haven't been to a lug meeting, I'd be happy to go to
one to answer any questions about my experience/knowledge on
polyphasic sleep.

@ Brian: The everyman schedule is fairly flexible, if you'd like
to talk about it more on IRC just let me know.

~ Jonathan


Alexander Ray wrote:

Interesting topic that's come up (at least for me) online, in
Wired
Magazine, at the most recent BarCamp RDU and most recently in IRC.

Polyphasic sleep is in a nutshell, breaking up your sleep
schedule so
you sleep for shorter periods more often (as opposed to one huge
stretch per day).
The end goal is that you sleep LESS overall time than you
would in one shot.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polyphasic_sleep

I'm definitely interested in trying a Month-long sleep
experiment on
myself sometime during the spring semester (no way that'd work w/
marching band in the fall semester).

Is there any other interest in the group for doing something
on this?
We could definitely have a talk/session on polyphasic sleep
and what
resources there are currently out there as well as what people
have
already found.

~Alex