Can you train yourself to need less sleep?

I know some people believe this, but I seriously doubt it. Your body requires sleep for various reasons. If you don't get it eventually you will feel the effects. I think that some people can train themselves to not outwardly feel the effects of sleep as much, however in the long run it catches up. My father worked shift work and on days he worked he wasn't tired, but otherwise he would fall asleep all the time, sitting standing and even driving once.

In my opinion generally speaking, we can train ourselves to need less sleep, but truckers are not in the same category. They need as much sleep as they can, because they travel for long periods at a time for hours, for miles and miles at a time, to reach their destination on a deadline and they need to fight fatigue by good sleep when they're not working. Other people who have 9 to 5 jobs I think can go to bed earlier or arise earlier until they worked out a system of sleeping less and train themselves to adapt to less sleep. Like I said I don't think truck drivers should attempt this so as to keep themselves and other drivers safe.