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C

A Century

Full of

Light and Coffee

B eing alive in the times of digitalization, innovation,

and technology is a great opportunity. It is a chance
to break new ground, be more efficient, and even
find creative solutions to problems that have been
around for centuries. But there is a trap. If we don’t examine
our past and decide to take our present for granted, we might
stay blind to the way we once were. Just because it is so now,
doesn’t mean it always was so and it doesn’t mean it will stay
the same. Take the way we sleep as an example. Did you know
that our ancestors used to sleep in two stages? That’s right, they
would go to bed early and wake up in the middle of the night
for a couple of hours. Then, they would fall back asleep until
morning. And it wasn’t even that long ago that this was hap-
pening. It is only in the past century or so that our sleep pat-
terns have changed to resemble the mono-phasic sleep that we
are used to today. But why is that so? And what does a light bulb
and coffee have to do with it? In answering such questions
perhaps we will learn something about ourselves that our bod-
ies already know and have been trying to remind us.

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