I see this a lot but isn’t the basic answer just that the brain needs to recharge and clean out toxins within the body?
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We know that during sleep the brain does a lot of stuff, like consolidating memories or clearing out certain waste products, but we don’t know why it can’t do that while we’re awake. We also don’t really understand why that’s crucial for life and why sleep deprivation can kill you.
What’s more, most animals need sleep. The need for sleep is so basic, that animals who cannot stop moving and/or being alert have developed something called unihemispheric sleep (only half of their brain sleeps at one time, while the other is awake). The fact that sleep is so pervasive is again quite strange and we don’t understand why so many animals need it and why no other type of mechanism which fulfills the same purpose has appeared throughout evolution.
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