There are reasons to believe that there are people who have a genetic characteristic that enables them to get by on that little sleep. This is a link to the stu

There are reasons to believe that there are people who have a genetic characteristic that enables them to get by on that little sleep. This is a link to the study referenced in the parent post's BBC article: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2884988/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2884988/ Furthermore, human genetic variation being what it is, there is no reason to dismiss "better genetics" in general. There are many genetic differences that make people better or worse than others at performing certain tasks. Some are obvious, some less so. But its certainly plausible that they exist, and dismissing them as part of an "echo chamber" is unjustified.