Jim Choate <ravage@ssz.com> wrote:
That current re-emits photons that retain both frequency and temporal/time related coherence (see Maxwell's Equations for more detail). However, the total number of photons MUST be reduced from the incident beam. This also means the incident photons can not be the same as the emitted photons.
The photons (as opposed to 'a photon') lose energy.
That still means your original post was wrong. Jim Choate <ravage@ssz.com> wrote:
The optics used for focusing are NOT mirrors, they are (hopefully) transparent at the frequency under use. A mirror on the other hand is required to be OPAQUE with respect to transmission, we want full, 100%, reflectivity. That means that every photon that hits that mirror interacts, loses some energy, and gets re-emitted.
See? "Every photon that hits the mirror," etc. You were under the impression that each photon lost energy. You were wrong. It's not hard to admit it. C'mon. If you don't want to type it, you can just cut and paste the following into a message: ---Begin cut area--- I, James Choate, was wrong. My statements concerning the interactions of photons with mirrors showed a clear misunderstanding of the underlying physics. ---End cut area--- -- Riad Wahby rsw@mit.edu MIT VI-2/A 2002 5105