Complex interaction processes we need to visualize that successfully fill the quantum cup of a detector

Sensors are measuring tools. In any measurement, we have at least two different kinds of interactants. We never know all there are to know about any one of these interactants and the interaction processes that are mostly invisible. Yet, our engineering innovation driven evolution is persisting for over five million years. It is then important to articulate explicitly our Interaction Process Mapping Thinking (IPM-T) that we keep applying in the real world without formally recognizing it. We present how the systematic application of IPM-T removes century old wave-particle duality by introducing a model of hybrid photon. It seamlessly bridges the quantum and the classical worlds. Photons are discrete energy packets only at the moment of emission; then they evolve diffractively and propagate as classical waves. Thus, "interference of a single indivisible photon" is only a non-causal assertion. We apply IPM-T to improve the photoelectric equation and we obtain Non-Interaction of Wave (NIW) amplitudes. Note that Huygens explicitly articulated NIW by postulating his "secondary spherical wavelets." Later Fresnel incorporated this postulate in the now famous Huygens- Fresnel (HF) diffraction integral. Most modern optical science and engineering are based upon propagating EM waves through optical devices and systems using this integral in some form or other. Maxwell’s wave equation accepts HF integral as its solution. Systematic application of IPM-T to our causal and working mathematical equations, along with NIW in interferometric experiments, reveal that Superposition Effects can emerge only when the interacting material dipoles respond, whether classically or quantum mechanically, to the joint stimulations due to all the simultaneously superposed waves. This indicates the non-causality of our belief that a single indivisible photon can interfere by itself. We would not have a causally evolving universe had any stable elementary particle were to change itself through selfinterference. Further, our working superposition equations always contain two or more terms representing two or more independently evolving entities. That is why we need physical instruments with two or more independent channels of propagation along with appropriately placed detectors to generate physical superposition effects. Nature does not violate causality. Otherwise, our causally framed equations would not have been working so elegantly.

[1]  Chandrasekhar Roychoudhuri Urgency of evolution-process congruent thinking in physics , 2015, SPIE Optical Engineering + Applications.

[2]  R. A. Houstoun A Treatise on Light. , 1925, Nature.

[3]  Chandrasekhar Roychoudhuri Consequences of repeated discovery and benign neglect of non-interaction of waves (NIW) , 2017, International Topical Meeting on Education and Training in Optics and Photonics.

[4]  Bialynicki-Birula Comment on "Quantum electrodynamics based on self-energy: Lamb shift and spontaneous emission without field quantization" , 1986, Physical review. A, General physics.

[5]  C. Roychoudhuri The Locality of the Superposition Principle Is Dictated by Detection Processes , 2006 .

[6]  Marlan O. Scully,et al.  THE PHOTOELECTRIC EFFECT WITHOUT PHOTONS , 1968 .

[7]  Chandrasekhar Roychoudhuri,et al.  Measuring properties of superposed light beams carrying different frequencies. , 2003, Optics express.

[8]  Chandrasekhar Roychoudhuri Hybrid photon model bridges classical and quantum optics , 2017 .

[9]  E. T. Jaynes,et al.  Long-Term Solutions in Semiclassical Radiation Theory , 1970 .

[10]  M. S. Zubairy,et al.  Quantum optics: Frontmatter , 1997 .

[11]  Chandrasekhar Roychoudhuri,et al.  Do we count indivisible photons or discrete quantum events experienced by detectors? , 2006, SPIE Optics East.

[12]  U. Keller,et al.  Photoemission and photoionization time delays and rates , 2017, Structural dynamics.

[13]  P ? ? ? ? ? ? ? % ? ? ? ? , 1991 .

[14]  Chandrasekhar Roychoudhuri Causal Physics , 2014 .

[15]  S. T. A Treatise on Light , 2022, Nature.

[16]  Chandrasekhar Roychoudhuri,et al.  What are the processes behind energy re-direction and re-distribution in interference and diffraction? , 2005, SPIE Optics + Photonics.

[17]  David M. Jameson,et al.  Introduction to Fluorescence , 2014 .

[18]  J. Stover Optical Scattering: Measurement and Analysis , 1990 .

[19]  M. S. Zubairy,et al.  Quantum optics: Dedication , 1997 .

[20]  I. Bialynicki-Birula,et al.  Quantum electrodynamics based on self-energy: Lamb shift and spontaneous emission without field quantization. , 1985, Physical review. A, General physics.

[21]  Chandrasekhar Roychoudhuri Demonstration and implications when 50% beam combiners can behave as 0% or 100% reflector/transmitter inside some interferometers , 2017, International Topical Meeting on Education and Training in Optics and Photonics.

[22]  Sergey A. Rashkovskiy,et al.  Are there photons in fact? , 2015, SPIE Optical Engineering + Applications.