Why do we sleep?

[Eric Mintz]

In article <2lbcl9$d7i at agate.berkeley.edu> hcorbett at garnet.berkeley.edu () writes:
>There is another theory as to "why we need to sleep" outside of the 
>regeneration hypothesis that was mentioned earlier in the thread. This
>is a possibly inaccurate portrayal of the justification put forward
>by Bruce McNaughton of the University of Arizona during a lecture of
>his I recently heard here in Berkeley. Consult his works for more
>accuracy.
>

[long explanation of theory deleted]
>So, the "purpose" of sleep (and the reason for sleep paralysis, closed
>eyes and the works) could be to give the long-term memory a chance to
>catch up with the day's experiences - a way of knowing what happened to
>you. I think this is a fascinating hypothesis and would welcome more
>discussion.
>

Sleep paralysis occurs only during REM sleep.  This may be a fine theory for
the function of REM sleep, which shows similar EEG patterns to those of
reptiles at rest.  Since "cold-blooded" animals which do not sleep should
have to integrate their spatial memories as well, this works out pretty well.
However, REM sleep does not take up the majority of sleep time in humans. 
Most of our sleep time is spent in non-REM sleep, also called Slow Wave
Sleep.  THe neuronal firing patterns in the brain are very different
between REM sleep and Slow wave sleep.  Does the model account for this?

Eric