this post was submitted on 22 Nov 2024
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Science Memes

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submitted 4 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[–] [email protected] 11 points 4 months ago (2 children)

Brain uses more wattage than a lightbulb, unless we are counting incandescent bulbs because it makes the stat seem more impressive.

[–] [email protected] 37 points 4 months ago (2 children)

That phrase first came out when incandescent bulbs were the most common, so they consumed like 60W vs 7W for an equivalent LED bulb. The brain is somewhere around 20W.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 months ago (1 children)

I don't give a damn about Lemmy points, but you just said essentially the same thing as the above commenter and the Lemmy points are diametrically opposed. I love it!

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

Oh yeah? I care even less about Lemmy points. Watch as I fearlessly downvote myself!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Yeah and LED bulbs were the norm 15-20 years ago. my point is this is a repost of a Reddit repost of a Tumblr comment that was reposting a factoid that was already wrong when it was originally posted 5-6 years ago.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Your timeline is incorrect. 15 years ago was 2009, when CFLs were most common. A 60W equivalent CFL was 13W and 100W equivalent was 23W. My house was still mostly incandescent bulbs with some CFLs for bulbs that had died and weren't on a dimmer. Commercial LED bulbs intended for residential use only started being released in 2009-2010 with incentive from the US government.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Ok, not in the US so idk. the last CFL bulb I bought was long before 2009.

Either way, the brain still uses more power than a 13W CFL, and the tumblr post is from 2018, and the Reddit post is even more recent. "It would have been technically correct if it was posted 20 years ago" doesn't really change the fact that it's not true anymore

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

LED was available in the early 2000s I have a few remaining LED lights from about 2001 (and definitely from before 2004) still working. They are much heavier than modern LED lights due to large finned heat sinks and didn't fit in my nicer light fittings. They weren't in supermarkets then, you had to look for them, I may have bought them online

[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 months ago (1 children)

It was estimated back when incandescent was standard.

Keep in mind that’s not accounting for energy consumed from neurons burning oxygen, which accounts for 20% of a human body’s consumption.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK28194/

[–] [email protected] 9 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (2 children)

20% of your bodies energy is about 20 Watts.

Normal-weight humans burn about 2200 kilocalories a day, which is about 9.2 megajoules. There are 8640 seconds in a day, so that works out to roughly 100 joules per second, or 100 Watt. 20% of that is 20 Watts for the brain.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Well done. So even added to the electrical consumption it’s less than an incandescent bulb. Incredible.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

But not electrical. 20W of power, but not electrical power

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

That's rest consumtion tho.