Cecil Moore wrote:
Jim Kelley wrote:

Cecil Moore wrote:
One wonders why you have not commented on the interferometer
experiment that intercepted the energy reflected from the
standard output during destructive interference and routed
it to the non-standard output thus illustrating an equal
amount of constructive interference.

I've used laboratory interferometers for over 20 years, Cecil. It
seems like I've been trying to explain how they work to you for almost
that long.

Translation: I am so afraid of that web page that I deleted
it and hope nobody notices. I refuse to discuss the interferometer
example because I am afraid to be proven wrong.

Please share your usual mealy-mouthing response about how I
don't understand that web page at:

http://www.teachspin.com/instruments...eriments.shtml

PLEASE NOTE THAT THE ENERGY REJECTED BY THE DESTRUCTIVE
INTERFERENCE PORT WAS ON ITS WAY BACK TO THE SOURCE BEFORE
IT WAS INTERCEPTED. CAN YOU SPELL R-E-F-L-E-C-T-I-O-N?

Cecil,

I looked at that web page, and my reaction was merely, "so what"? There
is nothing in there that is not well known to everyone who has ever used
or studied interferometry.

You seem to forget that the entire argument on RRAA in this theme is not
about *what* happens, it is about *how* it happens. There is not one
person who would seriously claim any violation of conservation of energy
to be valid. There is not one person who would be surprised to learn
about constructive and destructive interference and the redistribution
of energy. Anyone making competent physical measurements would find the
same, predictable results.

What *is* at issue is the mechanism involved. None of these web
references aimed at the Popular Science crowd even attempt to get into
those fine details. You love to quote a web page written by a Java-dude
and a lab technician. You love to quote a web page written by a
manufacturer of lenses and other optical components. Now you are quoting
a web page from a company who is "dedicated to the design, development,
manufacture, and marketing of apparatus appropriate for laboratory
instruction in physics and engineering." None of these are necessarily
wrong in what they are attempting to say. What *is* wrong is trying to
use these popular-level tales in support of your hair-splitting arguments.

Spend some time reading a serious reference on conservation of energy in
electromagnetic systems. You will come to understand that your concerns
about "wave cancellation" and related stuff at interfaces are not only
unimportant, they cannot even be determined by rational analysis. It
comes very close to counting the angels on pinheads.

If you really want to dig in further, you will need to start to look at
the detailed interactions of the waves with the interface materials,
including the scattering formalism. Reflection does not just "happen". I
do not suggest going there unless you need some sleep inducement.

73,
Gene
W4SZ