I bet the answer is obvious. If I had to guess it’s because the brain needs to rest.
In: Biology
While you’re awake your brain is filling up with waste products from metabolism going on, which is actually a lot of metabolism.
When you sleep the blood circulation in the brain increases, capillaries dilate and blood flow increases and gets in to flush out all the crap. But this process inhibits the brain’s ability to function in a conscious state so you lose consciousness through it.
Some animals like dolphins have the ability to shut off one half of the brain independently from the other – but we, and most land mammals, don’t have this. The performance trade off might just not be worth it on land vs in the ocean.
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