[lysace]

> Solar electric energy production in South Africa in 02019 did indeed average about 500 megajoules per second throughout the year,

Except that isn't what the article says:

"In South Africa, for example, the total amount of energy produced from solar systems in 2019 was thought to be about 500 megawatts"

[kragen]

500 megawatts is literally defined as 500 megajoules per second.

[lysace]

I'm sorry to say that I think you are muddying the waters. Competently, too. Kudos.

[kragen]

What, by giving the standard SI definitions of units so that people can see that the things you're saying are different are actually the same? You have a funny idea of what's muddy and what's clear.

[lysace]

You are mixing things up. On the one side there's the verbiage. On the other hand there's the units. You are mixing these things up in an extremely verbose way and I don't care for for it. Please just stop trying to actively mislead us all.

But hey, you reached your goal, killing the velocity of my comment way up there.

You planted the seed of "doubt".

[kragen]

I was explaining why the misconception you were repeating was wrong. (It turned out to be a popular one.) I suppose that since you still haven't figured out that it was wrong, that looks like "misleading" to you, but actually you are the one doing the misleading. It's good to doubt your beliefs; that way you can abandon the false ones. Try it.

I think it is pretty common for reasoning to require a fairly long explanation to become clear. Hopefully I've achieved that for most readers, even if you are still struggling. But if you object to this thread being "extremely verbose", why are you copying and pasting the same comment into it here and in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41998632?