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btrettel8y00

You're mixing things together. If I adapted a polyphasic schedule and also fixed real issues in the process, and have now significantly better sleep due to fixing those, then I am not "mildly deluded yourself and are avoiding disconfirming evidence." [...] Instead, I am correctly observing better sleep and am just attributing it incorrectly. So those are different things.

(note also that I am not avoiding any evidence because I have never encountered any evidence against p/s until today).

That is not what I meant. As an example, consider that you dropped a glass of water. Someone who was tired might attribute that to being tired, but someone who very strongly wanted to believe that polyphasic sleep worked would probably try to find an explanation other than that they were tired.

The argument is circular. You say that [...]

No, I think you are putting words into my mouth. My assessment of the weakness of evidence for short polyphasic sleep schedules is based primarily on the a) evidence that it does not work, including self-reported evidence (most people completely fail, and I see no reason to believe they all are "doing it wrong", etc.) and b) the fact that the standard mechanisms by which it could work are not plausible. I actually started investigating polyphasic sleep thinking the idea was plausible, but the more evidence I encountered, the less I believed.

I believe I have discussed a in sufficient detail.

For b, polyphasic sleep proponents used to claim that polyphasic sleep allows you to go into REM quickly, and REM was all you need, therefore polyphasic sleep was more efficient. To be fair, some of this is true, but the general message is false. The studies I linked to in my posts from 2014 suggest that deep sleep is the most important, but there's reason to believe all stages are important. With that said, as I recall (will need to dig up the study for this), certain antidepressants completely suppress REM and those people are doing fine best I can tell (at least compared against other folks on similar antidepressants without REM suppression). The technical term for a sleep period where one goes in to REM fast is SOREMP and it's taken as a symptom of either severe sleep deprivation or narcolepsy, and not regarded as good thing.

So, a better argument would be that polyphasic sleep allows one to get the same or greater amount of deep sleep, while reducing time in less important stages of sleep. This by itself seemed plausible to me in 2014, so I looked more into it. Unfortunately, as I stated in my 2014 posts, in actual polyphasic sleep, you experience each stage of sleep in relatively the same proportion as you did before. Both REM and deep sleep decrease. (Please note that this is contrary to what the Polyphasic Society claims! Their claims: "The body can also change the first portion of a ‘core sleep’ from mostly stage 1 and 2, to mostly stage 3 (SWS)" and "Because you are sleeping more often and getting dream-full REM in your multiple sleeps, you will be dreaming more!")

There are also some arguments like "this is how our ancestors slept, therefore it's how you should sleep too". There are a few things I think about this. First, it does seem that many of our ancestors did do some sort of biphasic sleep, either with a gap in the middle of the night or a nap in the afternoon. I don't think this was done to reduce sleep time, so it's not an argument for those sorts of schedules. Also, while evolutionary arguments are okay for generating hypotheses, they also need to fit the evidence, and as I said, the evidence really isn't a point in polyphasic sleep's favor.

Consider my perspective for a moment. Polyphasic Society prophesied a bunch if one does X , I estimated that they were credible based on presentation, I did X, I got pretty much exactly what was promised in about as much time as I thought it would take. Now you come telling me that all improvements are due to side effects and p/s has actually zero benefits. That's not impossible, but clearly less plausible. Why should I believe it?

You should believe me because the Polyphasic Society's arguments are based on faulty understandings of sleep, and are contradicted by empirical studies, many of which were conducted by someone they hold in high regard, Claudio Stampi. See here for additional details.

And what is it about the presentation of the Polyphasic Society that makes them seem credible? Their assertions generally have no citations. They seem like your standard alt-med website, which I don't consider credible.

If polyphasic sleep worked, you would see it advocated by sleep doctors and researchers, and also used by the military. These people are not unfamiliar with the idea. As I recall, the military is very interested in optimizing sleep, but they focus on things that actually work, like good sleep hygiene and getting physical exercise.

The paragraph reads stronger than the arguments actually are. Let me untangle them [...]

There are a very large number of possibilities. I mentioned consolidated sleep as an example because I know many people wake up frequently and this prevents them from having good sleep quality. Look up sleep hygiene. Any number of those pieces of advice could have had a big effect. Personally, I find having a regular schedule to be of the greatest help to me, but that might not be the case for others. I can not pin down what's happening to you other than that I do not believe polyphasic sleep by itself is helping.

Honestly, this just seems silly. The experience of tiredness is subjective. What matters is how tired I feel, and I feel significantly less tired than previously (except in the morning, as I've said already, and this is improving).

Experience is subjective by definition. Why being tired is bad is not necessarily subjective, however. Does it matter if you subjectively "feel" awake if you'll fall asleep if you sit down for 10 minutes? Does it matter if you subjectively "feel" awake if your cognitive performance is reduced?

See, you're assuming here that the number is lower than what should be expected, and that needs explaining. I don't think that's true.

In my 2014 posts, I used a success rate which was based on numbers from a major polyphasic sleep proponent. Personally, I think this number is very high (i.e., the failure rate is lower than I would put it at), but I have not done the polyphasic sleep census I think would be necessary to figure out it more precisely. I choose this number as it was the only one I saw available, and I thought it would be hard to accuse me of trying to paint polyphasic sleep in a bad light if I used a number from a proponent, but I guess I was wrong.

– Most people try harder ones first (that already gives you a majority that'll almost unanimously fail)

I am unsure. My own experience suggests that people gravitate towards the less extreme forms, as you did. I'm not aware of any polyphasic sleep census which would allow one to determine this.

– Most people probably don't do it correctly

I've seen a wide variety of reasons given for why people fail, and it seems to be to basically be variations of the No true Scotsman fallacy or even straight up cherry picking. Sure, I'd expect many people who attempted polyphasic sleep to have done it wrong. I, however, see no reason to conclude that almost everyone who tried it did it wrong. The procedure does not seem that complicated and I do not think it's particularly sensitive to many variables. The base rate for success for these sorts of things in general seems to be higher. I need a better explanation than just asserting that the majority of people do it wrong. Evidence for this assertion would be appreciated.

– Most people probably don't try that hard (more controversially, most people are lazy to begin with)

I definitely do not believe that most people who try polyphasic sleep don't try that hard. I've skimmed blogs where people tried this and the overwhelming impression I got was that they tried really really hard. And usually they seemed to think it would work up until they quit. This was my impression. I'd like to see some sort of polyphasic sleep census to help answer these questions, as I've said, that doesn't exist.

One person I know tried polyphasic sleep, and as I recall, they definitely tried hard, but ultimately failed.

(addressing the [[]]): Now that's a really bold statement. Do you have evidence?

I do not think this is a bold statement at all. It comes from my reading about polyphasic sleep over the years. I got the impression from people who failed that they did do exactly as they were told (or nearly so) and did try hard. That's what I meant. Again, absent a polyphasic sleep census, I can't give stronger evidence than pointing out a few of the blogs I recall skimming through. I'd be happy to do a few minutes of digging if you are interested.

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7 Open thread, Oct. 31 - Nov. 6, 2016

by Gyrodiot

31st Oct 2016

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[-]morganism8y70

new hypothesis claims to solve 5 of the biggest problems in physics

Physicists have come up with a new model that they say solves five of the biggest unanswered questions in modern physics, explaining the weirdness of dark matter, neutrino oscillations, baryogenesis, cosmic inflation, and the strong CP problem all at once.

http://www.sciencealert.com/this-new-hypothesis-claims-to-have-solved-5-of-the-biggest-problems-in-physics\

Unifying inflation with the axion, dark matter, baryogenesis and the seesaw mechanism

We add to the SM three right-handed SM-singlet... (read more)

2MrMind8y

Big hopes were in supersymmetry too, and yet nothing has been found. It's better to not be too much excited about a physics model until it's proven at least plausible: there are many interesting completion of the Standard Model that will be nonetheless proven false. In this model, the axion is in the same field with the inflaton, which is something I think has never been done before, so it's interesting. It's a good thing that it will be testable, so we'll see.

[-]gwern8y50

I've posted a bibliography of recent genetics links: http://www.gwern.net/Mistakes#genetics-links Good for getting up to speed on GWASes and everything that's been going on for the past decade.

[-]turchin8y40

My new map about asteroids and impact risks is up! This map is part of the “Map of Natural Risks ” which is in turn part of the map “Typology of Global Risks.”

TL;DR: Observation is the best instrument in asteroid risk reduction, and large nuclear anti-asteroid defense could be more of a threat to Earth and be of negative value; but the main uncertainty is whether we live in a period of intense bombardment because of recent large comet break-up.

The full text of explanation is here: http://effective-altruism.com/ea/136/the_map_of_impact_risks_and_asteroid_d... (read more)

[-]turchin8y40

I am working on the map of asteroid risk and defence. If you want to look into the draft, and provide interesting feedback, please PM me, and I will send the pdf.

[-]Secret_Tunnel8y10

Am I crazy for thinking that Fahrenheit is a way more user-friendly system than Celsius when it comes to everyday life? 0 (very cold) to 100 (very hot) is superior to -20 (very cold) to 40 (very hot) both in having more granularity with its whole numbers and being a nice round range to deal with. Also, "Below 0" sounds way cooler (pun intended) than "Below -20."

Whenever I bring this up to any friends of mine, their immediate counterargument is "But almost every single other country in the world uses Celsius!", which obviously ... (read more)

7turchin8y

I used Celsius all my life and I feel it as most natural and effective scale. If it is above 0 C I will take my umbrella. If below, I will take care about my winter shoes. I think it is more about personal adaptation than about actual usefulness of the scale.

2Dagon8y

It's all arbitrary, and what's most comfortable is what you use most. Fahrenheit is more sensible if you only talk about weather, celcius (or kelvin) is way better if you do any energy calculations.

0ChristianKl8y

Why?

5arundelo8y

—http://isomorphism.es/post/3767526267/fahrenheit-versus-celsius

0ChristianKl8y

I do think it's a difference between whether my flat is heated at 20 C or 22 C. The range between 0 and 100 might map the weather better but there's a lot of temperature that I care about that's not weather. If I drink tea the second digit doesn't matter. There are water cookers that provide either 60, 70, 80, 90 or 100 degrees and that maps well to real world differences.

1ChristianKl8y

Remembering that water freezes and boils and 32 degree and 212 degree is harder then remembering that it boils at 0 and 100. The great thing about those numbers is that they are objective references points. Fahrenheit defined temperature by referring to the 'average human body temperature' which isn't a physical constant in the same sense as boiling temperature of water. Today the Fahrenheit scale is also defined over when water freezes and boils but at 32 degree and 212 degree. The difference is a clear 180 which is a round number if you think in base 60, but thinking in base 10 is a lot easier than thinking in base 60. Whether or not water freezes has a lot of effects on the weather. When deciding whether to walk about a frozen lake the amount of days that the weather was below 0 matters. For gardering it matters whether the soil freezes. I can't remember a use case where I would have wanted more granularity in my temperature scale then Celsius provides. When making sure that tea I drink is at 55 degree Celsius I would however need three digits to represent the temperature. Better compatibility with other SI units also matters.

2Secret_Tunnel8y

This is a good point; using 0 as a reference point for freezing, which does have real life applications (is it going to snow? will this morning's rain cause icy roads? etc.) is much less arbitrary than how it's used on the Fahrenheit scale. I suppose boiling has cooking applications as well? The granularity point is interesting; in the US, setting a building's thermostat to 68 degrees Fahrenheit vs. 66 degrees Fahrenheit is typically considered a pretty non-arbitrary decision as far as saving money vs. gaining comfort goes. Now that I actually stop and think about it though, if you asked me to guess what temperature a building I'm currently in's thermostat was set at, I'm not sure I'd actually be able to tell you. In fact, I'm not sure I could even consistently guess what temperature the air around me is without being at least 5 degrees Fahrenheit off. Now that you point it out to me, less granularity probably makes life a bit simpler.

0Good_Burning_Plastic8y

Plenty of Celsius thermostats can be set to within a tenth of degree (not that I know anybody who ever sets the tenths' digit to anything other than 0 or 5).

0username28y

If you want an imperial scale that is more definitely "human friendly" I would look at length. Measured in inches are things you manipulate with your hands -- 1 inch = one finger. Measured in feet are things you carry. Yards (plural) are too big to carry, bit you can measure them out by walking (1 stride = 1 yard). Or liquids, where gallons, pints, and quarts are factors of 2 separated from each other -- you break one unit into the other by (recursively) pouring into two equal sized containers, and leveling out.

0Lumifer8y

Those are some pretty unfortunate fingers that you have. That's... a big stretch X-) Except, well, y'know, there are four quarts in a gallon, them being quarters. Not to mention that there is e.g. a US quart, an Imperial quart, and a dry quart. They are all different, of course. And don't get me started about half-pints which are cups)...

0username28y

Width. 4 = 2*2. You divide things in half twice.

0Lumifer8y

Your fingers are an inch wide..? My comment stands :-P For your edification, the inch is supposed to be the distance between the knuckle and the tip of the thumb.

[-]niceguyanon8y10

This podcast from Tim Ferris is incredibly informative and interesting. He brings on some of the world's foremost experts in metabolism and life extension and discusses the latest in real science about Metformin and Rapamycin. This podcasts does a spectacular job in updating my layperson understanding of these two drugs.

There is a lot of super interesting topics they touch on, I haven't finished the podcast yet but heres a sampling:

mTOR, what it is and that it is probably the most important protein in regulating metabolism
Rapamycin may be more b

... (read more)

[-]Cariyaga8y10

Something I meant to ask weeks ago: Are there any reliable nootropics for reducing the need for sleep? (not just making you sleep less, but actively making you not need as much)

6btrettel8y

I did a fair amount of research into various techniques for reducing sleep need. There are certain drugs which increase deep sleep at the expense of other stages (preferably at the expense of light sleep). It is plausible these drugs could reduce sleep need. However, I should note that there are no studies into whether these actually reduce sleep need. This is purely speculation. Some candidates include ritanserin (available only for research purposes), trazodone (a common anti-depressant, used more commonly for insomnia), mirtazapine, pregabalin, gabapentin, and GHB. GHB is extremely highly regulated and is only available by prescription for narcolepsy. Moreover, it appears to be highly dangerous and I absolutely recommend against it. I should note that some of these drugs may have unacceptable side effects, or even unknown effects in the case of ritanserin. Ritanserin, however, is the strongest deep sleep booster I have seen. With that being said, it's not clear that the lighter stages of sleep are unnecessary, and there could be serious adverse affects from taking these drugs regularly for these purposes. I do not recommend taking these drugs for these purposes. My impression from the research was that no stimulant actually reduces sleep requirements. And I would count the -afinils as stimulants; the promotional literature wants to believe otherwise, but I see no reason to justify that. Future narcolepsy treatments may perform much better than stimulants do in terms of feeling, by physically turning off sleep signals in the brain. However, I suspect this would be ill advised for long term use absent narcolepsy. As for behavioral interventions, as I recall, there is reasonable evidence that exercise increases deep sleep. If you are interested, I could dig up the studies on these topics again and give you some things to read. Edit: I also want to add that the drugs I listed above are not anticholinergic, or are only mildly so (e.g., trazodone). Anticholinergi

2ChristianKl8y

That's basically that Modafinil does. On the other hand the research around whether it's healthy to reduce your sleep needs with Modafinil to four hours doesn't exist at the moment.

1turchin8y

Memantin in small doses like 2 mg.

0niceguyanon8y

I think low dose Melatonin was found to increase the quality of sleep as well as shorten the overall duration of sleep.

0siIver8y

I don't know about Drugs, but if you want to sleep less while achieving the same amount of regeneration, this is your answer. I'm doing segmented sleep as of now, which is the easiest alternative schedule, and have already cut the time by a bit and improved the quality of my sleep.

3btrettel8y

I strongly disagree about polyphasic sleep. Here's a series of posts of mine here explaining why I don't think polyphasic sleep works. I'm surprised how many rationalists seem to believe it works. The evidence supporting using polyphasic sleep to reduce sleep need is weak at best, and at worst the idea seems actively harmful. I suspect you are seeing some combination of a placebo effect and wishful thinking. Perhaps that's impolite to say, but I think attempting to use polyphasic sleep to reduce sleep need is overall harmful to most people, and I want to highlight that. Once I recall reading on the polyphasic sleep reddit that polyphasic sleep is a better way to manage sleep deprivation. That is to say, if you need to be sleep deprived, you'd do better on a polyphasic schedule. This seems reasonable to me. To be clear, it appears that to feel fully rested and get the full health benefits, you'd need to sleep a normal duration, regardless of how it's broken up. Polyphasic might be more convenient, but the duration will be comparable. Perhaps lucid dreaming or something similar could help you regain time "lost" to sleep. Or, you could look into what actually might reduce sleep need like the drugs I mentioned, or physical exercise.

2ChristianKl8y

There are many people who work well on 6 hours. siIver might sleep better because he moved from an inconsistent schedule to a more consistent one.

0btrettel8y

Fair point. There likely are other possibilities as well.

1username28y

Segmented sleep, what silver claims to be doing, was the norm of human society before electric lighting.

4btrettel8y

The evidence that segmented sleep was the norm does not appear to be particularly strong, but it certainly has enough historical references to suggest it was common. Further, I don't think segmented sleep was done for the purpose of reducing sleep need. Correct me if I'm wrong.

1Douglas_Knight8y

To put it another way: segmented sleep with an alarm clock was never the norm.

0siIver8y

I don't think that's harmful to say, but I think you're wrong. I'm doing it. It's working. There is your evidence. Let me respond to your suggested explanations 1| Wishful Thinking – what does that even mean? I am sleeping more than 2 hours less per day than I did for 99% of my life and am less tired than I was on average for the past 5 years. That is an observable fact. I'm not oversleeping constantly and pretending as if that wasn't the case. You either take that as a fact, or think I am deliberately lying, or think I am insane and unable to count to ten. Or I guess that I'm so wishful that I don't notice what by now must be massive sleep deprivation after a month of cutting much needed sleep. Placebo Effect – over 2 hours a day due to placebo? Sorry, those are not the least bit convincing. The explanation ChrstianKl offered is the only one that has odds significantly over zero. If it is true, then I've been doing myself a massive disservice by having an inconsistent schedule for most of my life. Could be. That is also really unconvincing. 1. We are talking about two hours a day in extreme cases. No-one naturally sleeps just two hours a day. (If I am wrong here, correct me). 2. The fact that most people who attempt polyphasic sleep fail is not some kind of covered-up fact or evidence against the concept. The website says so openly. Quote: And at another point they say that no-one has ever been able to adapt to Uberman on his own (meaning without help). I am also not surprised as even adapting my current schedule, which is super easy in comparison, has all in all been very hard. I managed to do it because I set it as my top priority and put lots of will power into it. And if it is true that Uberman is much more commonly attempted-- yeah, the 5% number sounds plausible. And 3. Do you really think all the people doing polyphasic sleep don't notice that they actually don't sleep less than before? (This is the weakest point, I could believe that it were the c

0ChristianKl8y

I have one anecdote from a girl who said she was sleeping an hour a day for a year in a context where there wasn't any reason for her to not be truthful about it. She didn't even take any modafinil. More importantly you think that there are a people who do long-term sleep of 2 hours per day with Uberman. Puredoxyk didn't stay more than half a year on the Uberman schedule. See my answer at Skeptics SE: http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/a/1007/196 If there are reports of people who lived long-term on polyphasic sleep that happened after 2011 when I wrote my post and that escaped my notice, please provide links. A lot of people do well on six hours of sleep. Managing on six hours is not an extraordinary claim. It's well established in the literature that regular sleep schedules lead to better sleep. You could also have gotten the same effect of feeling less tired easily with modafinil. Sleeping less without feeling tired doesn't mean that the sleep has all the benefitial effects that sleep commonly has. It's worth noting that both btrettel and myself are well read in this subject and had discussions before about it. We aren't simply judging something as not working because we don't have information.

0btrettel8y

I appreciate the detailed reply. Your statements are evidence, but not particularly convincing evidence to me. I do not believe you or anyone else involved in polyphasic sleep are deliberately lying, rather, I believe you have mildly deluded yourself and are avoiding disconfirming evidence. Let me be clear: mild delusion. You can clearly count to ten, etc. Again, this is rude to say, but look at it from my perspective. Sleep is important, and polyphasic sleep folks seem to get so much wrong about it, and they encourage people to get so little sleep. So I hope you excuse the potential rudeness and see this as a sincere attempt to help you. It can be difficult to know how impaired you are when you are tired. That is especially true when combined with the strong desire for polyphasic sleep to work. There are many additional possibilities other than "polyphasic sleep is reducing my sleep need". As ChristianKl suggested, perhaps having a more regular schedule is helping. Perhaps it's not so much the regular schedule as it is reducing time spent in bed awake, which as I recall can correlate better with feelings of restfulness than total sleep duration. (Consolidating one's sleep into more continuous blocks is frequently a goal of people with sleep trouble, and the therapy is basically sleep deprivation, not unlike what I believe you are doing to yourself.) Maybe you are actually a short sleeper who previously had poor sleep quality that a consolidated schedule has fixed. Perhaps it's something other than any of these possibilities. Given that the evidence supporting polyphasic sleep is weak at best, I encourage you to take these other possibilities more seriously. I should have given these possibilities more consideration as well, and I do now. I think there's a strong possibility that your apparent improved restedness is not from polyphasic sleep, rather, some other change you made recently. I also would suggest conducting more objective studies into your sleepiness

0siIver8y

(Will respond to a part, no time for everything) Okay. First, I concede that some of those are possible and admit that you might be correct. Second, there are a bunch of issues with your argumentation here. 1. You're mixing things together. If I adapted a polyphasic schedule and also fixed real issues in the process, and have now significantly better sleep due to fixing those, then I am not "mildly deluded yourself and are avoiding disconfirming evidence." (note also that I am not avoiding any evidence because I have never encountered any evidence against p/s until today). Instead, I am correctly observing better sleep and am just attributing it incorrectly. So those are different things. 2. The argument is circular. You say that evidence for polyphasic sleep is weak -> your improvements probably come from other sources -> they are not evidence for polyphasic sleep -> evidence for polyphasic sleep is weak Consider my perspective for a moment. Polyphasic Society prophesied a bunch if one does X , I estimated that they were credible based on presentation, I did X, I got pretty much exactly what was promised in about as much time as I thought it would take. Now you come telling me that all improvements are due to side effects and p/s has actually zero benefits. That's not impossible, but clearly less plausible. Why should I believe it? . 3. The paragraph reads stronger than the arguments actually are. Let me untangle them 3.1. A more regular schedule is the real cause – as I already said, this is the most likely explanation (in fact I added this as a disclaimer to every person I told about my habits and improvements IRL) 3.2. Reducing time spent in bed awake – Not the case, I think it has increased. 3.3. Consolidated sleep is the real cause – wait what? 3.4. Maybe something else – well this is a deux-ex-machina argument. Just stating that there are points in your favor that you are not aware of does not get assigned any weight in a discussion. So really

0btrettel8y

You are correct. This is exactly what I meant by "I should have given these possibilities more consideration as well, and I do now.". I should have also changed the earlier part of my post to back away more from the placebo and wishful thinking statements. The purpose of the elaboration was to explain my earlier statements in greater detail. That is not what I meant. As an example, consider that you dropped a glass of water. Someone who was tired might attribute that to being tired, but someone who very strongly wanted to believe that polyphasic sleep worked would probably try to find an explanation other than that they were tired. No, I think you are putting words into my mouth. My assessment of the weakness of evidence for short polyphasic sleep schedules is based primarily on the a) evidence that it does not work, including self-reported evidence (most people completely fail, and I see no reason to believe they all are "doing it wrong", etc.) and b) the fact that the standard mechanisms by which it could work are not plausible. I actually started investigating polyphasic sleep thinking the idea was plausible, but the more evidence I encountered, the less I believed. I believe I have discussed a in sufficient detail. For b, polyphasic sleep proponents used to claim that polyphasic sleep allows you to go into REM quickly, and REM was all you need, therefore polyphasic sleep was more efficient. To be fair, some of this is true, but the general message is false. The studies I linked to in my posts from 2014 suggest that deep sleep is the most important, but there's reason to believe all stages are important. With that said, as I recall (will need to dig up the study for this), certain antidepressants completely suppress REM and those people are doing fine best I can tell (at least compared against other folks on similar antidepressants without REM suppression). The technical term for a sleep period where one goes in to REM fast is SOREMP and it's taken as a sympt

-2ChristianKl8y

A lot of people believe in various alternative medicine paradigms because they make some predictions that turn out correct for themselves. Do you think that in general controlled scientific trials aren't necessary to gather firm knowledge?

0siIver8y

That is a rhetoric question, and I don't think it has anything to do with evaluation of evidence in the absence of controlled scientific trials. I'll also note that there is a lot of evidence for Placebo having strong effects on health, but (afaik) not on total duration of sleep.

1ChristianKl8y

There's scientific work on sleep and you believe in a hypothesis about sleep based on what you read on a website and limited personal experience. You ask "Why should I believe it?" when someone tries to explain your experience with phenomena that are established by the scientific literature instead of trying to explain it with an alternative theory that's favored by some people on the internet.

0morganism8y

The REAL polyphasic sleep pattern set: Newborn sleep patterns A survival guide for the science-minded parent http://www.parentingscience.com/newborn-sleep.html Some good info in the article

1ChristianKl8y

Newborns do sleep polyphasic but they sleep a lot more than two or three hours per day. According to the article: "Finally, newborns vary greatly in the total amount of time they spend sleeping. In the first few days, the average newborn sleeps between 16-18 hours a day (Iglowstein et al 2002). By four weeks, newborn sleep averages about 14 hours."

0siIver8y

I believe in science. I don't believe "science". Their are supposed scientific studies proving all kinds of wrong things. Maybe you took the fact that I haven't responded further to the initial big posts as me rejecting further information. That's not right. I intend to do more research. I just really have no time for it now, or in the coming two weeks and some. As of now, this whole discussion lead me to the state of belief that you're probably just wrong and polyphasic sleep works, but only with about 70% confidence. That number could easily go down further. You also shifted from "there could be some other explanations, maybe, if you aren't just imagining sleeping less" to "there are scientific studies proving that your benefits come from other sources!".

1ChristianKl8y

No, you are not reading carefully. I'm saying that you don't need new hypothesis to explain the effects you got and that they can be explained by established effects, suggests that the experience isn't evidence for the new hypothesis.

0Lumifer8y

"Works" is a very underspecified statement. In particular, I'm curious whether you mean "works for most people", "works for some people", or "works for a few people". I think it's pretty evident that it does not work for everyone, but people for whom it works exist. So the question is really "for which part of which population does it work?"

1ChristianKl8y

I don't think that it's evident that there are people who can sleep 2 hours per day with Uberman without taking a hit in some important cognitive functions. There are many more reports on the internet of people who claim to eat nothing and live on light then there are people who claim to be successful on Uberman for longer periods of time.

0siIver8y

I think we were arguing not about the applicability of p/s, but about the theory. So I meant "p/s works" = "splitting sleep into multiple phases in certain ways does increase efficiency and makes you require less sleep" If that is not the case, I wouldn't say p/s "worked" for me. Trying it would still have been one of the best decision I've made in years, but it would only be so because i also fixed real problems in the process. In that world, I would have achieved the same by improving hygiene and nutrition and fixing my schedule to regular, monophasic sleep, and arguably with less effort (although I actually kind of like the nightly hours, I might keep this even if I come to believe that it doesn't improve efficiency.).

1Lumifer8y

People are different. Few interventions (including chemical) work for literally everyone -- e.g. some people just don't react to common drugs or react in a way which the doctors politely call "paradoxical". So even in theory p/s might work for some but not all people. It seems to me that the closest analogy is diet. Take low-carb -- does it "work"? The answer is: it depends. It does wonders for some people, does nothing for others, and screws up the third bunch. Unless you understand the mechanism by which it either works or doesn't, all you can do is provide priors (e.g. works for 30%, does nothing for 60%, screws up 10% [fake numbers]) and say "try it and see if it works for you". I would want the same type of answer for the polyphasic sleep. What do you think are the baseline probabilities for, say, four potential outcomes? * Makes things noticeably better * Makes things a bit better * Makes no difference * Makes things worse

0siIver8y

You'd have to be more specific. Probabilities if what kind of person attempts or succeeds to adapt which schedule?

0Lumifer8y

No specifics. General population (or if you want, take the half above the median), and any polyphasic schedule.

0siIver8y

8.5% – 1% – 0.5% – 90% But those feel frustratingly uninformed

0Lumifer8y

OK, so basically you think that one in ten will benefit, nine in ten will suffer (and, presumably, revert back to "normal" sleep), and some small number will think it's all the same. Hmm...

0btrettel8y

This appears to be true if you must be sleep deprived. That is, if you want to operate at X% function, where X is less than 100, likely less than 70 or so, you would need to sleep a shorter duration on a polyphasic schedule than you would on a monophasic schedule. ("X% function" is somewhat vague, but I trust you understand what I mean.) However, if you want high X% function (say, higher than 90%) then the required sleep durations appear to be the same in either case. This could easily make polyphasic sleep likely less efficient considering logistics (time spent getting into bed, etc.) and time to fall asleep. I'd recommend taking a look at Stampi's book for more information on polyphasic sleep being efficient for sleep deprivation but not so for normal levels of sleep. I also want to note that the estimated percentages I gave above are for illustration only. Look at Stampi's book for more accurate information. I do not have a copy any longer.

0ChristianKl8y

How much do you sleep at the moment? How do you know that quality increased?

0siIver8y

1| Currently 22:30 to 01:30 and 04:00 to 06:30, plus usually one half-hour nap during the day (aimed at 20 min but I still need too long to fall asleep). So that's 6 hours; previously I think I slept about 8,5 hours a day. 2| I'm less tired during the day. To give you the full picture, here are some problems/counterpoints... 1| In the first week or so, I've been really tired in the section between the cores. That's now been resolved completely, but it's a hurdle to get there. 2| Still am a bit tired in the morning (though really not any more than before) 3| Getting out of bed is really hard. Like, super hard. I think I only manage it by throwing all of my willpower against that problem. It is getting easier, but it's taking its time (I've been doing this schedule for about 2 months and am still tweaking it). 4| I've had an awful, totally inconsistent schedule before, often going to bed later than on the day before repeatedly, sometimes taking a turn around the clock to fix it. So it's possible that some of the improvements would've also been possible with consistent monophasic sleep It still seems like an overdetermined issue to me. You can literally get 2 more hours every day (more with advanced schedules). No amount of effort isn't worth that advantage. At some point I want to make a LW post about it, once I have figured it out better.

1ChristianKl8y

You think that you could get more with advanced shedules. That doesn't mean that's true. Uberman has no good track record. It's even lacking in anecdotal evidence of long-term applicability.

[-]morganism8y00

New, open source, plastic re-cycle eqpt for home use. Plans, specs, etc.

Can make spools for 3D, or moldable pieces. didn't see if they had an injection molding machine. ( i can't see vids)

https://preciousplastic.com/en/videos/download/

[-]niceguyanon8y00

xpost from media thread:
Some early rapamycin anti-aging results from the dog people: improvement in dog heart health after 10 weeks of use.

I'm surprised by the lack of people experimenting with rapamycin and reporting on it from the internet; it seems like you can order in bulk cheaply.

It also seems to work in a way similar to Caloric restriction; this further updates my current belief that CR works for life extension.

0Lumifer8y

I haven't followed it closely, but doesn't rapamycin suppress your immune system? That seems like it would be counterproductive to a long and healthy life.

0niceguyanon8y

yes at the dosage for its original purpose for treating transplant rejections. However it was found to boost immune system performance in elderly test groups for flu vaccines.

0Lumifer8y

Link..?

0niceguyanon8y

This is the same study that is cited in the highly informative podcast that I posted earlier to the open thread.

0Lumifer8y

I don't like podcasts, they have too low information density. So, let me quote from Wiki on everolymus which is the same thing as the RAD001 referenced in your link (the paper is produced by Novartis, by the way): Does that answer your question of why self-experimentation with mTOR inhibitors is not popular?

0niceguyanon8y

My expectations of self-experimenters to put themselves in potential harm is overestimated.

[-]ingive8y-30

I have a hypothesis that System 1 and System 2 as we call it, can merge - maybe into System 3.

System 3 is a non-dual state of consciousness, in the present "flow". Intelligence is increased significantly, rationality and critical thinking.

You can induce System 3 state permanently by four simple steps. The exercise start with for example building trust with X emotionally. Recognizing that X has brought forth all of our reality, that X is necessary for us to even be able to question X itself. That we are X. That X has lead to all of our technology... (read more)

2niceguyanon8y

I have an interest/fascination with the workings and psychology of things that are cultish so I'll make a few comments/questions. * You sound like you have found something genuinely helpful to yourself and you want to share it. Have you considered that your initial few posts here come off as spamy, authoritative and recklessly confident; even if your intentions are pure? I mean why not just say hey guys this stuff really helped me, what do you guys think? Not even a YMMV disclaimer? * Will to divulge your connection if any to the organization or guru other than just being one of the many who clicked? * How old are you? * Lots of these ideas are not original so why so much emphasis on this particular guru? Why can't this just be a collection of useful advice? Why does there have to be an application or anything to join for that matter? * Just be careful with this stuff. Based on the testimonials page, here is what I think is happening to you. You're inexperienced/young and you've had an epiphany and it clicked so hard for you, but you're reading into it a little too much I'm afraid. Not saying your epiphany is bad or not important, I've had a few too, we all do. You're trying to figure shit out, but your BS meter isn't mature yet. I can tell you that this is grade A Deepak Chopra level BS. * Have you read chapter 27, 48 laws of power? * Do you have any plans to stick around this community and be a contributing commenter for topics other than this kinda stuff? I do hope you stick around, but don't be that guy that only calls for a favor though.

0ingive8y

I do recognize this, but I see it as a communication problem, I don't have the knowledge to be able to communicate it properly. It's probably less efficient than to get it right once. (90%) I haven't been using rationality in the right way for very long, or at all (even now). That's a good idea. I haven't clicked. I don't have a connection. Lol. To what? Critical thinking? 21 What do you mean? From what I wrote to MrMind? He asked if there is someone that has reached such a state of integration and which he can talk to, to understand the benefits. The track record speaks of the benefits, but what I wrote also directly answers his question. It is, nowhere on the wiki does it even mention a certain guru. I'm not really reading into it, I was wrong about System 1 and 2 merging. It was an invalid argument. If I had done my research you would also have the epiphany I have had. It's nothing compared to what others have had. This doesn't really make any sense. You do wear a certain tint of glasses based on what you assumed my response to MrMind was about, this is fine. It's a communication problem on my part and I take the blame for this, seriously. It's important to recognize to what extent logical thinking can be considered BS. It is contradictory in its nature to use logic to refute logic. It's the same way as stating critical thinking is BS. What's done here is simply aligning our emotions to logic, thus we tackle the root which all of our rationalizations answer to. If our emotions aren't aligned with logic, rationality, then doing the steps can do so. If you have any other ideas feel free to tell the world. If only one of you saw the light who have contributed to this community, you will have an enormous impact, if I told you that it would bring "friendly singularity" in 10 years. What do you have to lose? 5 minutes of your time? All you are doing is aligning your emotions to logic. If your most important value isn't logic/rationality, then your entire brai

1Pimgd8y

I'mma cherry pick in what I wanna respond to here... It sounded like what you did from the whole "system 3" story, with the idea that ... given that there is no real evidence shown, you must have personally experienced this? This is a version of Pascal's Mugging - give me 5 minutes and I'll give you a chance at your greatest goals. ... Except that if you buy into this, you'd have to spend those 5 minutes on every shaky claim. This can add up. So I set a point of credibility where I think "this sounds plausible and worth the effort" before I'll do it. ---------------------------------------- So I had a bit of a proper read through those 4 steps and to be honest... this is lacking in "how". There's a lot of talk and not a lot of instruction. I'm also worried about the assertion that "logic" is the best core value - valuing truth above all else is NOT a good idea - a basic level of survival comes first. That's why I'll leave certain arguments unresolved or certain bugs alone in my programming - the argument happened once, it's not an issue right now, if it becomes an issue I'll pick it up later again. The bug occurred once, only when doing a ton of things at the same time, fixing it is not a priority, nor is finding the cause a priority, I got better things to do. Maybe that's a strawman position, but I'm trying to say that it's not always worth it to hold "let things make sense" or "find out the truth" be your top goal. It's an important instrumental goal. But it doesn't help you function in society. Truthseeking doesn't help deciding what career path to follow. It can help in getting more information, but you need an actual GOAL to use this information for. If your most important value isn't logic/rationality, you might have something to live for. ... Thinking that through for a bit, I can see how the "most important value" might not be the "most practiced value". Consider a mother whose most important value is the wellbeing of her child - perhaps she will w

0ingive8y

I have only had certain insights but not the click. Connecting the dots and seeing the transformations made (the anecdotes, the observational evidence). It's most likely +EV because being rational, logical isn't far away from what many strive to be here 'less wrong'. The anecdotes and, the other 'benefits' speak for themselves along my first point. The 4 steps are the instructions, and it has worked! 40 or so have clicked. You simply do it, trust in logic, love logic. Find what emotionally drives you (you don't do anything here rationally) be present, load it with a negative emotion. Your inner child will then drop the teddy bear which is whatever value you have and automatically cling to logic. And.. bliss. Euphoria. No more duality. Oh, my GOD... LOGIC! :D Also add in "I AM LOGIC.. I AM BECOMING AWARE OF MYSELF" I'm kinda playing a little bit. Logic isn't about truth since we know with our current understanding of quantum mechanics that everything is inherently probabilities. Logic is just in line with what we are. Basic survival is obviously logical else we wouldn't be able to progress. But you won't be needing to patch things up with logic as you will change from within because all of our problems stem from our core. Now someone might nitpick this and talk about neuroscience how we're all neurons, yeah. But that doesn't destroy this argument. Well. You do things which make sense. Things that makes sense will be very beneficial for society. Finding out the truth has nothing to do with this. If everyone did things which make sense, with enough knowledge, the world would be a utopia. I'm not talking about truth seeking. I'm going to refute an argument you didn't make. Logic as a tool is inherently flawed because of the tool-bearer being flawed. Logic is used to rationalize and protect the emotions. That's the hypothesis. If you end the duality between the tool and the tool bearer, you just become logical. That's all. Well. The reason you even live in the firs

0Pimgd8y

Will probably reply to the rest later, if it matters, but... "you simply do it" is like telling me to wiggle my left ear: I have somehow figured out how to wiggle my right ear (and I have amused myself with this in a bored moment from time to time), but no matter how I try in those same bored moments, I cannot get my left ear to wiggle. Only by making my eyebrows move at the same time. Point is... when you say "You simply do it, trust in logic, love logic." it feels like you're telling me to move a muscle I don't know how to move. "You can do it, just twitch your left ear." "Trust in your left ear." "Concentrate on your left ear and feel it move." ... Sorry. Still can't move it without also moving my eyebrows. As for my emotional drive, that's missing at the moment in my life. I don't have a real goal. I'm constantly holding off on actually choosing a goal, instead opting to build more and more tools and acquire more and more resources so that I may spend them when the day comes that I finally want something. I have experienced wants, but those were either unachievable within reasonable timespan (of the "I'd want to see other human-intelligence level races" kind - and not even as a burning passion, just a curiosity), or perhaps marketing inspired (I wanna play that new game when it comes out, but it's still another 6 months before release) or easily resolved (I wish this problem was gone - a $5 - $25 item fixes the issue, or an hour of effort fixes it - think running out of space and getting a shelf, or learning how to configure a program on my computer to do something automatically for me).

0ingive8y

It's important to recognize that your emotions are driving your actions whether you are conscious/aware of them or not. After you've found beauty in logic, figuring out what is driving your actions is the next step. If you cannot trust or love logic, imagine something which you do love then. Then recognize why logic has allowed that which you love to even exist in the first place. Whether it be someone, a video-game, food or whatever. It's a connection you can make. There are quite some documentaries and videos you can watch about fractals in nature, mathematics, fibonacci sequence in nature and so forth. Cosmos is also a good show, in the last episodes there is some talking about questioning authority, thinking for yourself etc. Which not many (99.9%) do. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dasQ7HnDoI Fake-spucking is common, suppressing our emotions and this part can be quite scary. But you are emotional inherently, subconsciously. Regardless if you have a goal or not (hint: they're worthless) everything is happening now. Always now. It's always going to be happening in an ever changing now, simultaneously. Now, what is driving your action now? What is driving you to type what you type, what is driving you to do X? You have to keep asking yourself to start understanding why you do what you do. It's important. It's the actions now which we have to question ourselves why we do them. Which emotional drive are we feeding to make us feel good? Whether it be: comfort, validation, approval, money, self-esteem, not feeling worthwhile. It all boils down to safety and these values will never fulfill us. It all comes down to our neural activity in this moment, and actions which we are not in control of. Such as advertising. Then we feed the core value and get our reward-center stimulated. Well. You have to ask yourself why you want to see other human-intelligence races. Why you have this curiosity. What is driving you to want these things? It's very hard to pinpoint. I un

0Pimgd8y

The curiosity from seeing other human-intelligence races is because I like imagining "what-if" - in media such as writing and animation series I'm enthralled by worldbuilding. Combined, they create some interesting questions that serve as a mirror for our current society. I'm bored at work. I feel socially compelled to respond to a question. You seemed make an argument that pattern matches for me to pascal's mugging and I'm not sure you realized, so I commented on that. ... Also, because I thought it sounded like easy points, because that's the only other reason I can come up with. LessWrong has karma points, people will vote you up if you correctly identify a mistake in something (and the mistake is relevant, not just a typo), I like points because... ... probably because of a certain measure of validation (LessWrong has "smart" people, points represent the "smart" people saying you're right, so more points = more validation). When explained like that, it's really dumb. But I guess that's why I reply to this sort of thing (at first, mind you, not to this comment!) - Because somebody is wrong on the internet (see xkcd) and because internet points. As to why I reply to this comment; well, if you magically (woo, wishful thinking) do manage to point out a flaw in my thinking with regards to how I approach life, then that's jackpot. I dunno about that. Goals are input for planning. Without a plan, I end up doing things I feel regret about later (not in the sense of "dammit I went drinking again" but more like "blehhh I played a stupid browser game which turned out to not even be interesting and I'll never get that time back, even although I know there'll be a point in time later this week or maybe even tomorrow where I'll have a great idea". Examples are wasting time with stupid browser games only to find a good game or an interesting novel or interesting anime series... on a sunday evening. And work starts again on Monday, so I can only participate a little bit.

0ingive8y

Play this while reading for intense immersion: https://minddivided.bandcamp.com/album/tempest At some point, you can recognize how you were conditioned to believe those things. You might even think that this curiosity or belief is superior to others. In contrary to some random person in some town in Texas for example. It also becomes socially validated as it's probably popular in the intersubjective reality of Lesswrong and other communities like Reddit. I saw that, so it's a flawed argument because of pascal mugging. I haven't even googled yet what that means and to read some article here on lesswrong. But it's cool to know about. Well. You have to figure out why you have this need for validation, as it was something which was conditioned to you through your experiences in life. For example, if you were rejected by a girl in school you closed in and stopped trusting yourself and the world. Validation usually stem from low self-esteem, feeling a need to prove yourself to our world that you matter. But in all actuality, these are fictions which drive our actions. We know this but we don't know how to change it, until now. Just so you know, you are not your emotional core. It can change. That's what these 4 steps do and you radically go through a metamorphosis. So as you feel uncomfortable with being honest towards yourself and stopping the suppression of your emotions. You might realize you are aware of these things, you are that which experiences. But the sum of all is simply the practical I, or me or 'you' which we use to communicate to each other. But as dissonance increase. you have an easier time telling your inner child to let go of validation, comfort and so forth because of the negative emotions which you load into the memory. In the present moment. You can't scream at your inner child to let go of the teddy bear which has comfort/validation. It will simply just hold it stronger. That's why rationality doesn't work as well. You have to communicate emotio

0Pimgd8y

This sounds like taking drugs and turning into a logically optimal robot. ... That sounds like a worse life than what I have now. ---------------------------------------- I think we should stop this thread. I'm not connecting with this idea of yours and I can't think of anything you could say to convince me otherwise (hmmh TODO rethink that)... so when you try to convince me you're just tripping flags instead. For instance. ... And you have a better set of beliefs? I actually enjoy such worldbuilding exercises. I enjoy seeing other worlds like that. There have been series that seemed boring at first, but then started to contain more worldbuilding and organizing - and I enjoy those from the comfort of my room. I don't have a list somewhere that I show off to get validation. I don't tell others that I'm reading such and such book - mostly because I think it wouldn't interest them. I read them for my own enjoyment. I did this before coming to reddit and before coming to LessWrong. I think you're wrong about this point. It's on Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. Everyone needs some amount of validation. And I don't need a whole lot of validation. I've been diagnosed with Aspergers and ADHD - I don't want to use them as a shield in these discussions, because that doesn't help anyone - but perhaps it allows me to explain that I don't seem to have a need for validation all that much. I don't care as much what other people think of my clothing. I do refuse to wear things with stupid texts on them, but that's because I'm not a billboard. I don't care about the things society seems to be interested in like celebrities or fashion or cars or whatever kind of crap - it tends to not be socially acceptable to just sit in your room and play games all day, but I do it anyway because that's what I think is fun. Going outside is boring and cold. What I'm having issues with is not a lack of validation by others, but a lack of validation by myself. I see myself playing a ton of games

0Pimgd8y

What's fake-spucking? Google gives me some weird hits (sexting over skype?)

0ingive8y

I mean being a fake Spuck or a straw vulcan. You can search for straw vulcans on LW.

0Pimgd8y

His name is Spock.

0niceguyanon8y

When I day dream of being a new age guru, I strive to surround myself with people just like you. Sorry for the jab, but your exuberance makes me smile.

2MrMind8y

I doubt that our neurology can change so much. Is there anyone that has already reached such state of integration that I can talk to to understand the benefit of what you're proposing?

-4ingive8y

I was wrong with System 1 and System 2 merging into System 3. The choiceless awareness and so forth is still standing, no identity, story. You can watch a preview of the documentary which will be completed in about a month. Albert is an algorithm expert with around 141 IQ. https://www.twitch.tv/athenelive/v/97819915?t=28m40s Who says his 'intelligence' increased by 100 x, 1000 x. Well. Bachir Boumazza has been clicked for quite some long time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bachir_Boumaaza He's streaming live from around 19-22 CET every day, and afterward Richardo streams for about an hour. Both of them have reached this state of integration. Twitch.tv/Athenelive for the live streams. They do take calls from people who have the click/who wants it really badly. There's also quite a few that has reached this click, and you can find them at the discord (they have green names) https://logicnation.org/wiki/Main_Page -> https://discord.gg/NYX25Ab Smart people on LW!

2MrMind8y

That would mean that his starting IQ was 1.41 or 0.141, which is even more astounding. Anyway, I'm planning to contact some people at random from the subreddit who posted at least 20 days ago and ask them what they have done differently since they clicked. These should be fun conversations. On the other hand, if I'm not mistaken, this is the first bona fide cult of a Youtuber. I've never thought I would be alive for so long to experience such a cyberpunk time.

0ingive8y

Depends on your definition of 'intelligence' although one might see an increase (however small, maybe insignificant) in for example memory/verbal/spatial tests. It won't be very related to IQ I would assume (intelligence quotient). His IQ is around 141... Right go ahead, I'm looking forward to seeing the results. Make sure to do it scientifically for all of us to enjoy. What I mean by that, rigorous and patiently. We need more people to do the kind of work you are doing. Seriously :D I'm curious.

0ChristianKl8y

To me such a claim suggests that the person is out of touch with reality and not anything positive about the person making it.

0ingive8y

From a first glance, I would see why someone would think that. I have thought about that multiple times that there will be misunderstandings. At some point, you will have to wonder how you can quantify a radical change in your consciousness, perspective, and thinking. Imagine someone who crafts pots. The craftsman has an IQ of 140. Suddenly some insight struck this person and now the person wants to understand everything. Their entire thought pattern has changed. This same person can achieve anything, the limit is what people already have achieved and probably beyond that if we look back in history. So... from a craftsman to someone with infinite potential. It's hard to quantify 100 x, or even 1000 x increased 'intelligence'. Sure you can work at MIRI with a schedule of around 9-5 then travel home, buy In-N-Out on the way, eat some chips on the couch and watch TED talks while browsing Lesswrong. That's fine too. You can quantify your intelligence with ease or at least you won't say you have 100 x or 1000 x the intelligence a week ago. Because you know deep inside you aren't contributing to the world at your maximum potential and you don't know why. What your reward center is attached to is why. What your core value is why. What your emotions have aligned to find safety is why.

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