This stuff seems to me a kind of premature optimization for life. I know quite a few people who've done impressive things. None of them did it by sleeping less.
What did they have? Boldness, focus, an ability to see through illusions and fashions. I'd go for those first, and if you're still not getting enough done, then try sleeping less.
Sleeping less is actually a secondary benefit... Its really about avoiding burn-out and staying mentally acute over long periods of continuous work. Breaking up things with naps is actually highly effective.
I'll agree that its not about how long you work, but how productive you are while you are working. While there is no substitute for genuine, hard work, I'd advocate that a polyphasic sleep schedule can help some people with long hours of intense work.
> Breaking up things with naps is actually highly effective.
I disagree. Naps are inefficient. By breaking sleep up into more blocks you multiply the time you waste trying to fall asleep, shaking off "just woke up" grogginess, changing clothing, getting to and from bed, etc. Batching tasks is almost always more efficient. Grocery shopping every few weeks is much more efficient than going twice a week, for example.
I did some shift work for a while so I speak from experience. I would get about five hours of sleep before waking at 4:15am, and then take another hour or two of sleep in mid afternoon when I got home. I adapted comfortably to this and didn't mind it too much. But it did absolutely nothing for productivity or alertness. All it meant was more time spent changing in and out of PJs and lying in bed falling asleep. It also constrained the flexibility of my schedule because skipping the nap did a number on me.
Are people in siesta countries notably more productive than regular night sleep countries? I think evidence indicates the opposite. This whole "hacking sleep" thing is a red herring.
You could be right about premature optimisation. Shift workers live shorter lives than colleagues doing the same job. So, if you increase waking hours now then you may not increase your total and you might not spend them most productively.
Regarding greatness, political office impinges greatly on sleep. Margaret Thatcher was widely known to get as little as four hours sleep on a regular basis. Successive British Prime Ministers age relatively quickly after obtaining office. Unfortunately, I couldn't find any other examples. Therefore, it is likely that examples are outnumbered by counter-examples.
I've been tempted to attempt some form of polyphasic sleep. Currently it seems I'm practicing sort of free-running sleep... going to bed between 4am and 8am, waking up between 11am and 2pm...
Polyphasic sleep seems well suited for people in early stages of a startup, with very little external commitments... though that may change if it gets to the point of hiring additional employees, seeking funding, etc.
Pure polyphasic sleeping seems a little extreme to me since the days would end up blending together I think I might go crazy. But the everyman schedule is appealing because you still get a few solid hours of sleep to clearly delineate days.
I didnt have much luck with everyman taking naps spaced 5hrs apart. At 4 hrs I always got very drowsy and concentration would suffer. It turns out there are physiological reasons for this, with every 4 hours the body experiencing a small cyclical change in body temperature (See Why We Nap by Dr. Stampi for more info). But, YMMV obviously.
The nice thing about everyman is you can make it work at a day job, IF you can take a nap during your lunch break. Its very ideal for moonlighters as you still feel fresh after work and can code late into the night without suffering the consequences the next day.
I've been practicing various forms of sleep deprivation for a few years now. It's not to be taken lightly! The one lasting effect that I've been totally unable to eliminate is really poor memory. I have to take lots of notes now, and I really miss being able to keep track of everything in my head.
That said, I've pretty much settled on "sleeping like a warrior (Raa!)": Wake up when you have to. Work for as long as you're productive. Sleep when your body says "please". Get up, rinse, repeat.
This results in my usually having about one "dead day" a month, where I sleep 10 to 12 hours in one day, and an awful lot of days where I only get an hour and a half or 3, and make up for it by getting 6 the next night...
"/Leisure and Idleness/. There is an Indian savagery, a savagery peculiar to the Indian blood, in the manner in which the Americans strive after gold: and the breathless hurry of their work-the characteristic vice of the New World-already begins to infect old Europe, and makes it savage also, spreading over it a strange lack of intellectuality. One is now ashamed of repose: even long reflection almost causes remorse of conscience. Thinking is done with a stopwatch, as dining is done with the eyes fixed on the financial newspaper; we live like men who are continually "afraid of letting opportunities slip." "Better do anything whatever, than nothing"-this principle also is a noose with which all culture and all higher taste may be strangled.
And just as all form obviously disappears in this hurry of workers, so the sense for form itself, the ear and the eye for the melody of movement, also disappear. The proof of this is the clumsy perspicuity which is now everywhere demanded in all positions where a person would like to be sincere with his fellows, in intercourse with friends, women, relatives, children, teachers, pupils, leaders and princes-one has no longer either time or energy for ceremonies, for roundabout courtesies, for any esprit in conversation, or for any odium whatever. For life in the hunt for gain continually compels a person to consume his intellect, even to exhaustion, in constant dissimulation, overreaching, or forestalling: the real virtue nowadays is to do something in a shorter time than another person. And so there are only rare hours of sincere intercourse permitted: in them, however, people are tired, and would not only like "to let themselves go," but to stretch their legs out wide in awkward style. The way people write their letters nowadays is quite in keeping with the age; their style and spirit will always be the true "sign of the times."
If there be still enjoyment in society and in art, it is enjoyment such as over-worked slaves provide for themselves. Oh, this moderation in "joy" of our cultured and uncultured classes! Oh, this increasing suspiciousness of all enjoyment! Work is winning over more and more the good conscience to its side: the desire for enjoyment already calls itself "need of recreation," and even begins to be ashamed of itself. "One owes it to one's health," people say, when they are caught at a picnic. Indeed, it might soon go so far that one could not yield to the desire for the vita contemplative (that is to say, excursions with thoughts and friends), without self-contempt and a bad conscience. Well! Formerly it was the very reverse: it was "action" that suffered from a bad conscience. a man of good family I concealed his work when need compelled him to labor. The slave labored under the weight of the feeling that he did something contemptible-the "doing" itself was something contemptible. "Only in otium and bellum is there nobility and honor:" so rang the voice of ancient prejudice!"
Ironically, alot of this is stimulated by a lust for power. Keeping up with the Joneses is a form of social power. I've thought that Nietzsche's writing functions as a koan for the West's power drive.
Anyways, I agree. We can see this in how introverts are treated in our culture. They tend to be looked down on since they don't "do" things. I suspect, though, that most of the great thinkers who shaped the world were introverts.
However, the best approach is to not arbitrarily elevate leisure or action, but to consider the purpose of each.
What did they have? Boldness, focus, an ability to see through illusions and fashions. I'd go for those first, and if you're still not getting enough done, then try sleeping less.