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I heard many times that Albert Einstein needed a lot of sleep. For example, this BBC article claims that he typically needed eleven hours of sleep:

People's sleep needs can differ significantly.

At the extreme, Margaret Thatcher managed on four hours of sleep a night while Albert Einstein needed 11.

Is there any reliable reference supporting this claim?

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This is one of those claims that gets made every now and then and I've never seen it sourced except to say that he claimed to need the sleep himself. – JaseMachine Jan 27 '12 at 21:05
This doesn't strike me as a very notable claim; in the sense that the claim itself isn't very note-worthy--not that the claim isn't made in a notable fashion. Who cares if he (or N% of the population) sleeps 11 hours per day? That might be more than average, but it's not an extraordinary amount of sleep. Now if we hear a claim that someone only sleeps 1 hour per day, or 22 hours per day, then that would be notable. – Flimzy Jan 29 '12 at 1:45
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@Flimzy Einstein sleeping 10-11-12 hours is cited pretty much everywhere they want to "prove" that sleeping long is good for you, but there is never a credible source to support it. – Sklivvz♦ Feb 2 '12 at 8:22
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@Flimzy By no means its strange. Just it is repeated over and over without pointing to any reliable source. – Piotr Migdal Feb 2 '12 at 10:21
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@Sklivvz: well, it also makes the point that sleeping 4 hours is good for you, Margaret Thatcher did quite well, I reckon. – nico Nov 25 '12 at 20:48
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protected by Sklivvz♦ May 5 at 12:21

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