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Comment by warent | Hacker News Reader

That's awesome. I don't find it hard to believe that the octopus is dreaming, but I am a little skeptical of the interpretation of the evidence. Humans get erections throughout the night which have nothing to do with sexual dreams, so maybe the chromatophores cycling are just like that.

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My impression was that men get erections at night to prevent themselves from peeing when they have a full bladder while asleep.

But Wikipedia suggests that there is some controversy around the exact causes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nocturnal_penile_tumescence

It’s hard to imagine what reason a sleeping octopus would have for cycling through colors if not related to their dreams.

What about a purely "maintain in good functional state"? I mean, when there are not used, muscles atrophy. Maybe a similar phenomenon would happen if these cells were not regularly stimulated during sleep.

It is not a muscle

That was not the point, atrophy is not a phenomenon limited to muscles. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atrophy

Evolutionarily speaking, what would be wrong with peeing in your sleep?

The scent may have alerted predators to your location.

Urine attracts ticks and wet loin cloths can cause skin damage. Though for the erection part, erections are linked to the parasympathetic nerve system, which is fully active during sleep.(Which is why it's hard for men to get erections when they're chronically stressed)

You wake up with pee all over you.

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