Ok so I got this idea not while showering, but because I’m very high. The story does come from my bathroom though! I have a night light in my bathroom, and I was looking at the night light as I turned off the bathroom light. I’m a big nerd so I remembered that the things that detect light levels are actually diodes wired in reverse. I thought it would be funny to make it flicker by reflecting the light back on the diode, but it didn’t work. That’s when I had this realization

    • rockSlayer@lemmy.worldOP
      5·
      8 months ago

      From this source:

      A phototransistor is a type of bipolar transistor in which the base-collector junction comes into light. This results in the same behavior of a photodiode

      I’m high and I just wanted to post something low effort that I thought was funny. I know it’s more complex than the way I described it.

      Edit: also, diodes are directional. Saying that a photodiode is “a diode wired in reverse” should be the first sign that I know more than what I’m actually saying. All diodes are capable of reacting to light, a photodiode exploits and amplifies the principle.