Photosynthesis for the Dummy Biology Student

Photosynthesis diagram

It's pretty much an article of faith here at Antisocial Network Headquarters that a disappointing portion of the content written at content farms isn't worth the electrons it's printed on. Way, way, way too much of it was written by people who had absolutely no idea what they were talking about. We're thinking of people like eHowian Alexis Kezirian who, despite her course of study in college, pounded out an answer of sorts to "Is Photosynthesis Endergonic or Exergonic?"¹ at the mother site.

What's saddest is that Kezirian was supposedly on her way to a BS in biology at the time. That's probably why she got the three-word answer to the question right: "Photosynthesis is endergonic." Unfortunately, Alexis needed another 300 words or so to meet the dreaded minimum word count at Demand Media. While doing so, she somehow decided that,

"In order to carry out photosynthesis, plants must first obtain sunlight, water, carbon dioxide and chlorophyll through an endergonic process."

Wait, what? Plants must "obtain... sunlight... and chlorophyll"? Obtain chlorophyll? Did Alexis' Biology 101 class not clue her in to the fact that green plants contain chlorophyll within their cell structure? Which means that they do not need to "obtain" it at all! And for that matter, we're pretty sure plants do not "obtain" sunlight, they are exposed to it...

Kezirian goes on to differentiate (pretty much accurately) the difference between endergonic and  exergonic, although she again suggests that,

"[P]lants take in solar energy, water, carbon dioxide and chlorophyll to begin the energy process..."

...which flies in the face of grade-school botany, where fifth-graders learn that (green) plants contain chlorophyll. Whatever... finally, check out Alexis' version of the process of photosynthesis:

"The main component of photosynthesis is sunlight, which is carried through the plant by electrons. As these electrons are powered by chemical energy, they reposition themselves to form CO2 [sic]."

Yup: them there electrons "reposition themselves..." weird, though: we were all under the impression that CO2 is an input to photosynthesis and one of the outputs is oxygen. [checks Wikipedia... we were right...] Heck, Kezerian herself later says that "food--in the form of sugars and oxygen--is produced." Never mind that oxygen isn't food and that photosynthesis produces carbohydrates, not just "sugars": Alexis is on a roll... With all due respect to UBC, we sure as hell hope people with a BS in biology can describe photosynthesis more accurately than our Dumbass of the Day did in this post.

¹ The original has been deleted by Leaf Group, but can still be accessed using the Wayback machine at archive.org. Its URL was   ehow.com/about_5105641_photosynthesis-endergonic-exergonic.html

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