You Don't Know How Mirrors Work
Why Physics Stack Exchange recommends it
Physics Stack Exchange users link it when explaining why light travels in beams or how photons really behave, since it shows interference and path-sum ideas in an accessible way.
Recommended by 2 people across 2 different months, 2020 to 2023.
What it is
A 12-minute explainer from The Science Asylum (Nick Lucid) arguing that the simple 'angle in equals angle out' picture of mirrors is incomplete. It builds up from ray and wave optics to photons, wave functions, path probabilities and quantum mechanics to explain reflection.
What people said
Recommends rghome · 2020-06 · Physics Stack Exchange · on “Why is light able to shine in a narrow beam?”
Light does indeed radiate in all directions from any point where it can reach. However, those waves interfere with each other and the net result can be that the total amplitude of a wave at various places can be zero, even though the the wave has propagated there from some other point. The light beam exists because the interference of all the paths does not cancel along the path of the beam, but cancels everywhere else. Some good explanations are in a couple of videos from the Science Asylum which (as always) explains it clearly and humorously. The videos explain how light travels in the context of a mirror, but I think you will find it answers your question as well. You Don't Know How Mirro
Recommends RC_23 · 2023-06 · Physics Stack Exchange · on “"Artificially" time dilated photons”
This is a great question, and it shows you are struggling under the false picture of what a photon is. Pop culture science creates this bad picture. In brief, a the frequency of light is not the interval between two photon detections. Each individual photon is a wave packet with an innate frequency. If you want a picture in your head of photons, it's better to envision something like this [LINK] (source: [this video] ) Also here's a good overview with visuals: [LINK]
Cites Ankit · 2020-08 · Physics Stack Exchange · on “Should we trust quantum mechanics for working of the mirrors?”
In this [this video] video, it is explained that it is not necessary that photons obey the laws of reflection and each photon can take any possible path to reach the so-called black hole receiver and all the paths have some certain probabilities as shown in the picture. [LINK] But if that's the case why do we see a certain region of the room when we stand in front of the mirror as in this picture? Shouldn't we see even the corners of the room standing in the same position? But to see them we have to tilt on one side or move our head. [LINK] If mathematics says that probability exists then why don't we observe it in our daily life? Since it never happens shouldn't the probability be zero? Edit 1: