Qubit said:

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Why are you looking at the 99.9% as a waste? If I can do the job with less than I am MORE efficient, not less.

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Because the 99.9% is a waste.  The plant collects that energy and does not use it.  That is a waste.

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If the plant is collecting the energy and not using it, then where is the energy going?
I thought it was a matter of the plant not collecting 99.9% of the light which reaches its leaves. At least, that is what was said in the original post.
I thought collection was a matter of harnessing it and converting it, not simply having it reach the leaf....

Please clarify because you're only making the discussion more confusing, especially in light of the information Zouden provided that suggests the actual cells doing the photosynthesis are actually converting light energy at around 30%. 

Quote:

  If the plant were efficiently doing more with less it would have smaller leaves so it wouldn't have to waste all that energy.  But as it stands its inefficient so it has bigger leaves and wastes most of the energy it collects with those leaves.

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Demonstrate that leaf size is solely determined in relation to photosynthesis, to substantiate the claim that it would have smaller leaves if it was efficiently doing more energy collection with less.

You still haven't even provided a basis for the assumption that plants are being inefficient.
To label them as being inefficient implies that there is a potential capacity of them being more efficient.
Of course, no one shows any reason why we should think that this is the case.

In the meantime, be sure to characterize anyone disagreeing with you as doing so because "they don't want nature to look bad".
Doing so really carries a lot of substance behind it.

OrgoneConclusion said:

Obviously, you are correct, but as I have one grow area and no mother plant, I cannot do that at this time.

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An extension cord, a blue spectrum CFL (20watts), a socket, some electrical tape, and a Rubbermaid container equipped with a computer fan will solve that dilemma for you. Flowering from clones always seems to pay off dividends.

Phenotype variation will ensure you won't have any usable kind of control, I think, even for just gathering indications....

OrgoneConclusion said:

Seriously, if I take two seedlings that are 25% smaller than the control plants and they outgrow the controls, you don't think that would be indicative that something was going on?

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It'd be indicative that something would be going on, yes, but 25% difference in size is all within the range of phenotypical variation, especially considering that you're starting at three weeks, a point at which its simply impossible to tell how different two phenotypes will be by the time they've started flowering, even if they are of a similar size at three weeks (IME). The strain would have to be stabilized to the point of being nearly inbred to have enough consistency to not consider phenotype variation as not being a threat to your control.

I'm not saying you need to have it science fair perfect and I'm not saying this to just be difficult but simply because even indications are going to be entirely inconclusive because the difference in how the phenotypes would have grown without the experiment is completely unknown.

MushroomTrip said:

Then get some god damn feminized seeds, even though I really think that a few extra months isn't such a hassle, especially since this doesn't mean that you'd have to stop flowering while you're waiting for the other female(s) to become ready to take clones from.

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More people doing this equals faster and more precise addition to the knowledge pool, so get off your goddamned ass and help me out by doing your own goddammned experiment! Must I do EVERYTHING!?



Sorry, I lost it there. (This has been a shameless plug for my Free Will thread.)

kydelic said:

You're missing the point about rate of absorption, etc. And the fact that photosynthesis is much more efficient as a whole process for what it does. A college biology class would enlighten you more on how you really are comparing apples to oranges. PVs use the difference in energy between an electron at its ground state and it's excited state (excited by the sun's energy, the difference is where the 'volt' in photovoltaic comes from), whereas photosynthesis uses these excited electrons to start a cascade of chemical reactions which release much more energy than the electrons falling back to their ground state by themselves.

This is also assuming in a typical western European Christian view of a God and that He created every plant and animal and designed every system to a tee by Himself. We all know that's bullshit.

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fireworks_god said:

Qubit said:

Quote:

Why are you looking at the 99.9% as a waste? If I can do the job with less than I am MORE efficient, not less.

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Because the 99.9% is a waste.  The plant collects that energy and does not use it.  That is a waste.

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If the plant is collecting the energy and not using it, then where is the energy going?
I thought it was a matter of the plant not collecting 99.9% of the light which reaches its leaves. At least, that is what was said in the original post.
I thought collection was a matter of harnessing it and converting it, not simply having it reach the leaf....

Please clarify because you're only making the discussion more confusing, especially in light of the information Zouden provided that suggests the actual cells doing the photosynthesis are actually converting light energy at around 30%. 

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Quote:

How can those reactions release more energy? Where is the energy coming from? I think it'd be the other way around, the process of putting the energy into a usable (chemical) form is lossy.

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fireworks_god said:

If the plant is collecting the energy and not using it, then where is the energy going?

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kydelic said:

Quote:

How can those reactions release more energy? Where is the energy coming from? I think it'd be the other way around, the process of putting the energy into a usable (chemical) form is lossy.

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More energy than simply the electrons falling back to ground, there is more because there is energy from the nutrients that the plants absorb through soil and water. The photons help induce a chemical reactions, and the excited electrons (IIRC) act as supports for the different cycles within photosynthesis.

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