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jquery·

From the article:

> Non REM Stages 1 and 2: Light sleep NREM-sleep

> Non REM Stages 3 and 4: Deep slow wave sleep (SWS)

> REM-sleep when dreams occur

> FFI patients cannot go past stage 1

It appears they are getting sleep, but only stage 1 sleep. That might be what keeps them alive for 9 months. If stage 1 was blocked, I venture to guess their survival duration would be much lower.

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Here's some other research data. In Guamtanamo they kept prisoners awake 11 days and found "surprisingly, little seem[s] to go wrong with the subjects physically." In rat experiments they all died by 32 days. I'm guessing full sleep depravation in humans would have a similar result to rats though thankfully no one seems to have tried that.

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/explainer/20...

Not to veer off topic, but that's horrible and depressing.

Though I can't recall any specific examples, I've heard that the experiments carried out in Nazi Germany added significantly to the scientific literature about what happens to the human body under extreme conditions.

... and since scientific results obtained in any way are good enough, US and russians were very happy to get their hands on Nazi "research" done in concentration camps. It was basically slow torture to death usually caused by infections from really twisted experiments, ie sewing in "patient" hay and observing him die slowly over weeks, without helping.

some would say once experiments were done and over, there isn't much that can be done to countless victims. albeit true, using these further gives some sort of approval on all of it (ie becessary evil BS).

I'd guess (and hope) that the Guantanamo results were not based on scientifically rigorous research.

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