this post was submitted on 26 Aug 2025
417 points (94.3% liked)

Science Memes

16461 readers
2159 users here now

Welcome to c/science_memes @ Mander.xyz!

A place for majestic STEMLORD peacocking, as well as memes about the realities of working in a lab.



Rules

  1. Don't throw mud. Behave like an intellectual and remember the human.
  2. Keep it rooted (on topic).
  3. No spam.
  4. Infographics welcome, get schooled.

This is a science community. We use the Dawkins definition of meme.



Research Committee

Other Mander Communities

Science and Research

Biology and Life Sciences

Physical Sciences

Humanities and Social Sciences

Practical and Applied Sciences

Memes

Miscellaneous

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] Engywuck@lemmy.zip 61 points 1 day ago* (last edited 9 hours ago) (6 children)

Watt is not an energy unit.

[–] absentbird@lemmy.world 10 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

People say this, but almost every time the time interval is left off it's hours.

Either way, the numbers in this meme are clearly made up. Most image generation uses fewer than 10 watt hours.

[–] Engywuck@lemmy.zip 7 points 18 hours ago

People say this, but almost every time the time interval is left off it's hours.

This is new for me. Must be some engineering thing. I'm a physicist and and I feel guilty if I leave out some units just because, lol.

[–] flandish@lemmy.world 27 points 1 day ago (1 children)

it’s about energy transfer though. transfer of titty whats to watts to my mind.

[–] HumanoidTyphoon@quokk.au 9 points 1 day ago

That’s just science

[–] unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.de 20 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Its continuous to keep the image active in your mind :)

[–] bryndos@fedia.io 3 points 1 day ago (3 children)

That'd need watt hours though. Meme is only showing the instantaneous power required to conjure the image for an infinitesimal amount of time - you cant do any useful 'work' with it unless the time is accounted for. Watt seconds maybe.

What makes me skeptikal of this data though is that the correct sciencing term for a billion watts is the well established 'jiggawatt'. In this context I'd have also accepted the Canadian spelling 'jigglewatt'.

[–] BussyGyatt@feddit.org 2 points 20 hours ago* (last edited 20 hours ago)

not "infinitesimal time." continuously. think of it like this: to continuously think up perky tits, it takes a human mind 12 watts- brain is a 12 watt computer. time interval is proportional to the number of titty images/length of titty video. and im psure an individual instance of titty ai doesn't come out to 2.7 jigglewatts- im like 80% sure i can get a (small) titty generator to run on my lil 50 watt phone. not testing that assumption today tho.

[–] unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.de 1 points 18 hours ago* (last edited 18 hours ago)

Yeah no. Imagine it like a computer and screen. To render an image it will momentarily consume a bit more power, but as soon as it has been rendered it will still continuosily consume a stable amount of x Watt to keep running and displaying the picture. For continuous stable operation of something with no specified time, Watt is the correct unit.

[–] ryannathans@aussie.zone 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)
[–] bryndos@fedia.io 2 points 17 hours ago

yes, which is what you'd measure to compare the energy efficiency of completing a job.

[–] joelfromaus@aussie.zone 7 points 1 day ago

Watt would you suggest?

[–] Steve@startrek.website 4 points 23 hours ago (2 children)

And the text dosnt specify a time interval, whats your point?

[–] Engywuck@lemmy.zip 5 points 20 hours ago

That watts by themselves mean nothing with regard to energy consumption.

[–] REDACTED 2 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

Also, it literally is an energy unit used in measurements. It's meant as a continious power. Ie. Your active imagination consumes around 12 watts of power, not "rendering one image"

[–] Eheran@lemmy.world 2 points 18 hours ago (1 children)
[–] REDACTED 1 points 10 hours ago (1 children)
[–] Eheran@lemmy.world 1 points 7 hours ago (2 children)

Power is energy per unit of time. Energy is power over a period of time. A lightning strike is about 1 GJ of energy. But it happens in a split second, so the power is far higher, say 100 GW. That is the output of 100 nuclear power plants. But only for 0.01 seconds.

TNT is even more extreme. It can detonate in microseconds, so release its energy in a fraction of a millisecond. 1 kg contains about 4 MJ of energy, released in about 10 microseconds, a power of about 300 GW. That is about as much power as all of the USA combined needs.

[–] REDACTED 1 points 5 hours ago

Power is energy per unit of time

Thanks.

[–] BlueMagma@sh.itjust.works 1 points 7 hours ago

You are off by a factor of ~250, it's 1.21 Gigawatts