this post was submitted on 20 Dec 2025
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Science Memes

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



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If you are here asking: "Is this a science meme?"

Probably, yes. We use the Dawkins definition of meme: a replicating idea, not just an image macro with a fact on it. A good post here doesn't need to teach you something. It needs to make you ask something: who, what, where, when, and especially why or how.

Science isn't a filing cabinet of facts, it's a conversation. For example, a photo of an eel or other localized wildlife counts because most people never see one, and wonder is the first step of inquiry. A car meme counts if it makes you curious about what's under the bonnet. If you want to talk about something you noticed in the world, chances are someone else wants to talk about it too.

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See the pinned paper on Shitposting as Public Pedagogy if you want the academic case for why this works.



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[–] mnemonicmonkeys@sh.itjust.works 1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

a sidereal year is 365.256 days.

No. A sidereal year is 366.24 days.

And 11 days isn't "and some change"

[–] stray@pawb.social 2 points 6 months ago

The figures in my post are ephemeris days since that's the way Wikipedia lists them.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sidereal_year

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_month#Sidereal_month

"And some change" is a phrase to refer to a number following a decimal point, meaning the sources I find claim there are thirteen point something sidereal months per year, at a figure too low to round to 14. Here are some example sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orbit_of_the_Moon#Lunar_periods

http://scienceline.ucsb.edu/getkey.php?key=1126

I still can't find a source which says the moon makes 14 sidereal orbits per year, using any definition of year.