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> Yet scientists have found it oddly hard to say exactly why sleep loss is lethal. Barf. This kind of straw-manning is all too common in science journalism. IA
by pkghost 6y ago
> Yet scientists have found it oddly hard to say exactly why sleep loss is lethal.
Barf. This kind of straw-manning is all too common in science journalism. IANAS but I know that normal metabolism generates free radicals (electron-greedy molecules), which then steal electrons from anything they touch, causing damage. If that damage isn't repaired regularly, then our basic metabolic pathways breakdown, and we die.
I'm sure there are mysteries to unpack beneath this, but why treat the reader to a moronic underrepresentation of the state of the art?
- diroussel 6y agoIf I find I can't open a door, it cllouls be because there is a lock. If I remove the lock does that mean the door can be opened? No, there might be another lock, or rusty hinges, or nails to the frame. Just because we might be able to remediate this one mechanism in the gut doesn't mean we can solve sleep. What about memory formation? Or immune system effects of sleep?
- pkghost 6y agoI think you misunderstood? I meant: we understand one way in which sleep loss can kill sufficiently well that we don't need to describe its lethality as "oddly hard to explain". That doesn't mean there isn't more to learn about sleep, or other things about sleep that are, indeed, oddly hard to explain.