I’ve always admired people who only need 5 hours of sleep or less. I,
on the other hand, tend to take on zombie-like qualities if I get less
than 8.

Are there ways to decrease the number of hours necessary?

Dear Markabe:

I was unable to find an authorative answer on your desire to sleep
less. However, I found a few things that could point you towards what
you seek.

There is a new drug called Modafinil. (http://www.modafinil.com/) It
is known to allow people to go extended periods of time without sleep.
However, this drug is perscription-only, and may be a controlled
substance in your country. See this news article for more:

http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/265/nation/Who_needs_sleep_New_pill_hits_scene+.shtml

Changing your habits like eating may also help, according to an
article found at guru.com. High-protein diets and proper time
management could be your key. See here for more:

http://www.guru.com/channel/life/askexpert/Q547.jhtml

You should ask a doctor before taking any medication or radically
changing your lifestyle.

--
samrolken-ga

Search Strategy: "modafinil" on google, "sleep less" on google, "some
people sleep less" on google.

Not a bad answer, but the comments helped.

A couple of months ago, I was fortunate enough to see a lecture from
Dr. James Maas, a professor at Cornell University who is a sleep
expert.  See http://comp9.psych.cornell.edu/faculty/people/Maas_James.htm
for more information about him and his work.

Maas was very emphatic in his belief that lesser amounts of sleep are
harmful for humans -- to the point where he believes that lesser
amounts of sleep will cause health problems and shorten expected life
spans.

I think there was a study a couple months ago that received fairly
wide press coverage.  As I recall, the study compared death rates
amoung groups of people who got varying amounts of sleep, and found
the lowest death rate was for people who got about 7 hours of sleep. 
Getting more or less sleep than that correlated to (slightly) higher
death rates.

The study did not show that the differing amounts of sleep *caused*
the differences in death rates, only that there was a correlation.

The study did not look at the effect of changing amounts of sleep.

If I had the money and know-how I'd love to conduct a stuady showing
the benefits of a consistant sleep schedule vs. an unconsistant
schedule. I've always felt the best with 7-8 hours of sleep, the same
times every night. Meaning that you pretty much fall asleep at 11 and
wake up at 6 every day... too many people have inconsistent sleep
schedules and I believe this leads to colds, and potentially disease.

There is an interesting discussion on sleep at Slashdot and Kuro5hin.
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/12/19/1313212&mode=nested&tid=134
http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2002/4/15/103358/720

Talks about polyphasic sleep (splitting sleep into little chunks).