do beagles dream olfactorily?
Nov. 14th, 2004 11:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dragonlady7The dog's asleep on the couch beside me.
She's dreaming.
And kicking me in her sleep.
Apparently humans have a nerve that shuts off their motor abilities while they are asleep. Most other mammals lack this. Why?
Humans' early ancestors slept in trees, and having a dream wherein they twitched and ran would knock them out of the tree.
Similarly, horses have a check ligament in their legs that prevents them from falling down while they sleep. However, they require several hours a week of REM sleep, which they must lie down to take. I still believe that our family horse Tiger, always nervous but worse once we got our other horse, a dominant, bullying mare, stopped lying down to sleep, and went slowly mad. He died of entirely unknown causes after about a year of deteriorating and eccentric behavior, which no vet could explain to us.
Dave twitches in his sleep. I asked him about it and he said it usually happens when he's not quite asleep, and it's not dreaming, it's just reflex. His skeleton is somewhat larger than his tendons and ligaments were quite intended for-- he can't come close to touching his toes without flexing his knees-- and his legs in particular twitch a great deal while he is falling asleep.
Sleep is a strange thing. We sleep in approximately 90-minute cycles, and the deepest sleep is about an hour after falling asleep. We fall asleep, submerge rapidly, and then resurface very gradually. At the end is REM sleep, which is the dreaming stage, and then we are quite close to being awake. Which is why we often awake from dreams. If we are awakened out of the dreamless stages of sleep, we are groggy and it takes a long time to come to consciousness.
Ideally, we should have time to go through three of these 90-minute cycles in a night. The length of the cycle varies somewhat. Many people can get 3 cycles into 8 hours, which is why it's so often held up as an example of a good length of time for nightly sleep.
Dave can't function on less than 9 hours. I think his cycles are slow and he spends a lot of time very deeply asleep. We are both light sleepers who return easily to sleep. Which is nice; I don't have to worry that if I wake him he won't be able to sleep again.
Which should serve us well if that guy ever calls me back and I wind up ending bar until 4 every morning.
Bert's still kicking me.
She's dreaming.
And kicking me in her sleep.
Apparently humans have a nerve that shuts off their motor abilities while they are asleep. Most other mammals lack this. Why?
Humans' early ancestors slept in trees, and having a dream wherein they twitched and ran would knock them out of the tree.
Similarly, horses have a check ligament in their legs that prevents them from falling down while they sleep. However, they require several hours a week of REM sleep, which they must lie down to take. I still believe that our family horse Tiger, always nervous but worse once we got our other horse, a dominant, bullying mare, stopped lying down to sleep, and went slowly mad. He died of entirely unknown causes after about a year of deteriorating and eccentric behavior, which no vet could explain to us.
Dave twitches in his sleep. I asked him about it and he said it usually happens when he's not quite asleep, and it's not dreaming, it's just reflex. His skeleton is somewhat larger than his tendons and ligaments were quite intended for-- he can't come close to touching his toes without flexing his knees-- and his legs in particular twitch a great deal while he is falling asleep.
Sleep is a strange thing. We sleep in approximately 90-minute cycles, and the deepest sleep is about an hour after falling asleep. We fall asleep, submerge rapidly, and then resurface very gradually. At the end is REM sleep, which is the dreaming stage, and then we are quite close to being awake. Which is why we often awake from dreams. If we are awakened out of the dreamless stages of sleep, we are groggy and it takes a long time to come to consciousness.
Ideally, we should have time to go through three of these 90-minute cycles in a night. The length of the cycle varies somewhat. Many people can get 3 cycles into 8 hours, which is why it's so often held up as an example of a good length of time for nightly sleep.
Dave can't function on less than 9 hours. I think his cycles are slow and he spends a lot of time very deeply asleep. We are both light sleepers who return easily to sleep. Which is nice; I don't have to worry that if I wake him he won't be able to sleep again.
Which should serve us well if that guy ever calls me back and I wind up ending bar until 4 every morning.
Bert's still kicking me.
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no subject
Date: 2004-11-15 03:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-11-15 05:32 pm (UTC)But I didn't, I stayed up, I persisted, and I got more work done. I'm so good.
I'm so sleepy.
:D