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RobusEtCeleritas t1_jcd2xwg wrote

Reply to comment by subjectivity_one in How many photons are released during emission? by subjectivity_one

The single photon is emitted in a superposition of all directions, with the angular distribution defined by the angular momentum it carries. However when you detect the photon, you entangle the state of your detector with the state of the photon such that the state of the photon decoheres to a single direction. So it looks like the photon traveled in a single, random direction, as opposed to a superposition of all directions.

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subjectivity_one OP t1_jcigo1g wrote

Thanks for taking the time to explain this. I don't pretend to fully understand it yet, but it leads me to many more questions, which I deeply enjoy.

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