Ask any question you want about Physics

a reply to: Arbitrageur

I will attempt to answer the question in the video.

If vert light is removed by lens 1. We only need to care about available horizontal axis light. 180 deg.

With lens at 45 deg to lens 1. A further 50% horizontal light is lost.

At 22.5 deg. Only 12.5% will be lost. Which is 1/8th of 180 deg.

Adding more lenses at 22.5 deg to each other will not loose more light.

Once the first 12.5 deg light is lost. The available light looses on one side but gets it back from the other.

No matter how many lenses you have. The relationship is only dependent on the difference between lens 1 and 22.5 deg.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

I have watched this persons video's on relativity in the past. But i'm lost with the math.

Just found this one today.

He's great.

I'm not watching it all. I'm lost with the math.

At around 11 min. He is discussing a coin flip.

He says it's 0s and 1s.

Heads (0). Tails (1),

Heads is (-!) (0) tails (+1).

I'm lost again after this point. And make it through to 20 mins. Scratching my head.

Apart from that. It is a cool lecture.



www.youtube.com...

originally posted by: blackcrowe
a reply to: Arbitrageur

I will attempt to answer the question in the video...

The relationship is only dependent on the difference between lens 1 and 22.5 deg.

No, it is not "only dependent on the difference between lens 1 and 22.5 deg". I gave you a link to the correct math a few posts ago, which could be a little over your head, but one concept you should be able to understand is that the math is non-commutative. Your post implies the sequence of the filters doesn't matter, but it does matter, and that's sort of what makes it an odd phenomenon according to simple logic, which might suggest that the order of the filters shouldn't matter. Even if you don't get all the math, you should get that much of the concept, that re-ordering the filters changes the results, as explained in the link. You don't need to know math to understand that idea that the sequence of the filters matters, but if you want to calculate or predict how much different the result will be with a different sequence you need math for that.

Remember this? Or are you not reading my posts?

"I found some course notes that explain the math of how you can calculate what the polarizing filters will do..."

originally posted by: blackcrowe
He's great.
...
I'm lost again after this point.

If you're lost, why do you say "he's great"? He's trying to over-simplify. I did watch the part where he says it's not a normal lecture in quantum mechanics where you might get lectured on such topics as the Schrodinger equation, wave functions, etc.

Instead he gets into quantum information theory but it seems muddled and over-simplified and apparently I'm not the only one who thinks so, this is one of the comments:

The way he explains bits is very, very confusing and doesn't really make sense to me. Why doesn't he just name a monochromatic x/y-array like everybody knows from computer displays - everybody today would understand what he is trying to say. Messing up classical issues like room temperature gradients with bits in the way he does is just confusing, because it's not a real good model for moving air molecules for example.

Since he's trying to over-simplify it so you don't need math and you don't get it, "he's great"?

Keep in mind this is not a course to learn the actual mathematical proofs of Quantum Mechanics, but to understand it intuitively. It’s an open course for us that have no true mathematical background.

So you're not getting real quantum mechanics, you're getting over-simplified almost to the point of being wrong dumbed down examples and if you can't even understand those then I fail to see why you think "he's great". Maybe he knows physics but there are much better lecturers/speakers who explain things more clearly. The video Kryzma posted is one such speaker, another clear speaker is Harry Cliff explaining how he hopes we can still accomplish something at the LHC after finding the Higgs:



In my opinion Cliff does a way better job than Susskind of simplifying complex topics; everything Cliff says is crystal clear to me (I guess my physics background might help but I'm not a particle physicist and I think a wider audience should be able to understand a lot), and even though his speech may be dumbed down somewhat, what he says is still accurate as far as I can tell.

I suppose I may be somewhat biased against Susskind since he's credited as a "Founder of String Theory" which is in fact a misnomer, because as my signature indicates, string theory is not really a theory and I would struggle with even referring to it as string hypothesis. I'm more inclined to refer to it as "not even wrong" which is the worst insult I can think of for an idea that makes no testable predictions. It's a bit more defined than the cartoon in my signature, but to my knowledge "String Theory" still hasn't made a single prediction which has actually been observed in experiment, which means it's not a real theory. Even when I try to set my bias aside, I personally think there are much better speakers/lecturers.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

Thanks.

Remember this? Or are you not reading my posts?

If you mean the link. Yes i did read it.

I was also distracted by thinking about the experiment. It's no excuse. But. It's the truth.

If your trying to bring my attention to the adding of lenses at 22.5 deg will turn the horizontal axis round.

I did contemplate it. And it could be thought of like that. It would be correct. if you are thinking that you're rotating a marker by your position as ascending numbers.

If you don't use numbers to mark the position. Your left with lines in a position.

After the 2nd lens has taken it's 12.5%. 1/8th of 180 deg.

The lines (long molecules) position is such that. Every time a lens is added. There are only two positions possible for the lines to be in.

I dismissed this as irrelevant. My reason is that you're left by a situation that is the equivalent to rotating one way or back to original position of lines in 2nd lens.

So, i said was dependent on 1st lens instead of 2nd lens?

I hope that was the reason to point it out again.

And. I really hope you understand my explanation.

If not. Please spell it out for me . As i can be a dumbass at times.

If you're lost, why do you say "he's great"?

I was being sarcastic.

I also said it was a cool lecture, he starts with wrong math at 11 min, scratching my head till 20 min, lost in his math and turned it off at 20 min.

I couldn't know if it was a cool lecture. I didn't sit through the next unimaginable drivel that the remaining hour had to offer.

But. Now i see how you feel.

I don't feel too bad about my cheap ass remark.

The Beyond the higgs vid. I watched when you linked it while questioning the sunspot incident.

I remember i did enjoy it (no sarc).

I will definitely watch it again.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

I will try to explain in my crude math. Which i hope you understand.

If we label the lenses from left to right as, (0), (=1), (+1).

(=1) and (+1) are the two positions responsible for blocking or allowing the light.

Each blocks 12.5% of light.

Any additional lens. Would then become a (-1) or a (+1).

originally posted by: blackcrowe
I was being sarcastic.
...
I remember i did enjoy it (no sarc).

I had no idea you were being sarcastic, but instead of typing in (sarc) or (no sarc) the way I usually interpret remarks is to take them seriously if not modified, but if somebody writes

He's great.


The added eyeroll emoticon suggests I probably shouldn't take that seriously. Otherwise without such clues I have no way to tell the comment was sarcastic, since written communication doesn't allow for the same tells as verbal communication like tone inflections which might indicate sarcasm. This should be in an "internet101" course. It's also even more important on ATS than on other sites, like if I post on James Randi's forum about my perpetual motion machine the assumption there is it's a joke or sarcasm, but on ATS some people actually talk about those and they aren't joking, throw in some buzz words like "Tesla" and "frequency" and "Illuminati" in a discussion of how TPTB has perpetual motion tech but won't let us have it because Big Oil needs to make a profit.

originally posted by: blackcrowe
a reply to: Arbitrageur

I will try to explain in my crude math. Which i hope you understand.

If we label the lenses from left to right as, (0), (=1), (+1).

(=1) and (+1) are the two positions responsible for blocking or allowing the light.

Each blocks 12.5% of light.

Any additional lens. Would then become a (-1) or a (+1).

That makes no sense to me. The filters can have any orientation, so let's call a vertical polarization 0 degrees, and a horizontal polarization 90 degrees.

Q1. Let's say the first filter is 0 degrees, and the second filter is at 5 degrees. How do I apply your math to calculate how much light passes both filters?

(assume reflection and other losses are negligible, to calculate just the polarization effects).
Then there are more complicated scenarios where I have no idea how to apply that math, such as:

Q2. The first filter is 0 degrees, the second filter is 90 degrees, and the third filter is 45 degrees, how much light passes all three?

Q3. The first filter is 0 degrees, the second filter is 45 degrees, and the third filter is 90 degrees, how much light passes through all three?

Q2 and Q3 are the same three filters at the same angles, but in a different sequence and illustrate the non-commutative properties of the math, which I have no idea how to calculate from your explanation. But like I said all the math is worked out in the source I linked for you so I'm not even sure why you're trying to re-invent the math when we already have the math worked out. It uses the "Bra" - "ket" notation that Susskind explained in his lecture you linked, but I think it's explained better in the written document I linked which explains the math. That notation and an associated set of rules is presented as a means to deal with the non-commutative properties of the filters' behavior. There are also trigonometry functions involved in the math which you don't mention.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

Thanks.

I understand the confusion in my sarc comment. Noted.

Here is a pic. It shows light entering lens (0). An equivalence of the now filtered light is represented by an area split into 1/8ths.

It passes through lens (-1). And we can see what amount of light is removed. In green.

It passes through filter (+1). And we see what amount of light is removed. In green.

Yes it gets much more complicated when you have to account for variables.

As in. The 12.5% removal of light over the more widely accepted. Although seemingly woo figure of 15%. Mine is more woo. But there is no woo. So who's correct in this situation? Me with 12.5%, or Bell's 15%?

The only explanation for me is. If Bell is right. He measures with the variables. I haven't.

The complexities occur upon the collapse of the waveform.

Collapse is a terrible description. And to me means the entropic transformation of energy. Chaos.



This is at the tiniest of scales.

If you want to add more info. Add more axis. But it becomes more difficult to draw on a flat surface.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

Sorry. I mis coloured a green bit.

New correct pic.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

One more point to add.

Lens (0) removes 50% of 100% of 360 deg.

Lens (-1) removes 12.5% of 100% of 180 deg.

Lens (+1) removes 12.5% of 100% of 180 deg.

originally posted by: blackcrowe
Yes it gets much more complicated when you have to account for variables.

George Box said "All models are wrong, some are useful". The math we have for polarizing filters may not know the correct physical model, but the math is useful because it makes correct predictions. If your math is not only wrong like all other models, but not useful either if it can't account for the variables, what's the point?

As in. The 12.5% removal of light over the more widely accepted. Although seemingly woo figure of 15%. Mine is more woo. But there is no woo. So who's correct in this situation? Me with 12.5%, or Bell's 15%?

I have no idea what you're talking about here. If I had to guess it looks like maybe you saw 12.5% mentioned in some example somewhere but I don't know why you are using 12.5% in your math. The angles of the filters are continuously variable and the useful math follows trig functions based on that. I re-checked the sources I gave you and the video mentions 22.5% as an example angle, and it mentions 15% of the photons getting blocked at that 22.5 degree angle. But those aren't the numbers you're using and they are just examples. A good model will deal with any angle or series of angles.

I also noticed you didn't or maybe couldn't answer any of my questions about how to apply your math to some simple examples. You were supposed to come to realize on your own that your pursuit is not bearing any fruit, but maybe I have to be less subtle and just tell you frankly that since you can't show me how your model relates to those simple examples, it seems completely useless. The whole point of having models in the first place is to be able to answer those kinds of questions which you haven't done.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

Thanks.

Q1. Lens at 0 deg is removing 50% of (100% of 360) deg the light. eg vert axis.

Lens 2 at 5 deg is removing 5% of (100% of 360 deg.) of (100% of 180) deg of filtered light.

= 9%.

Q2, Lens at 0 deg same as in answer 1, 50%.

Lens 2 at 90 deg removes 50% of (100% of 360) deg of (100% of 180) deg of remaining filtered light. eg horizontal axis.

= 0

Lens at 45 deg removes 25% of (100% of 360) deg of (100% of 180) deg of remaining filtered light.

=0.

Q3. Lens at 0 deg. same as above. 50%.

Lens 2 at 45 deg removes 25% of (100% of 360) deg of (100% of 180) deg of remaining filtered light.

= 25%.

Lens at 90 deg removes 25% of (100% of 360) deg of (100% of 180) deg of remaining filtered light.

= 25%.

Add another at 45 deg. Same answer.

= 25%.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

I hope this chart will help.

It shows % of light blocked by degree of rotation. After it has passed through a lens which has then removed 50% of original light source.

a reply to: ErosA433

Hi ErosA433

...he wishes to claim or state that the geometric confinement of a laser is entirely based upon blocking light that emanates to the sides in a circular wavefront, and so is only projected forward.

YES! EM propagates in all directions.

By his own reasoning, he seems to suggest that every light source can be turned into a laser with the application of geometric collimation.

meaning the wave form YES, but I do not suggest it, YOU imply this trying to make me sound stupid !
to make a laser it's more complicated, and you know it, so stop telling things I didn't said or suggesting I did.

Lasers operate via stimulated emission, a property that occurs in QM in which a photon, causes a electron from a higher energy level to drop to the ground state, transfering the energy to the electromagnetic field in the form of a photon that has the same directionality, and wavelength and is coherent with the incoming photon

"a property that occurs in QM ??"
what does it mean ? is QM the new reality ?
All electromagnetic radiation is caused by displacement of charged particles in electric field and this induces magnetic fields, not by some theory called QM!

come down on earth please

Now what is important to note is that observationally, the experiment works, if you use a high intensity laser that is producing millions of coherent photons at every second. It also still works if you fire each photon separately. What appears to matter is that the light is coherent. What this strongly suggests is that photons undergo the same process of interference with or without the presence of other photons. It suggests that the waveform or wavelength property of the photon is exactly that...

so the photon is a particle you say, but it has a waveform and wavelength ??

so... it is JUST a NAME for the waveform and a wavelength... wave in what ??

let me repeat...
a "Photon" is just a name ( not existent ) for electric and magnetic wave ( existent ) and it's form...
a name for a "piece" of the EM wave, nothing else than a name, not a thing !

and you say I don't know what I'm talking about and I'm just trolling ???
disappointing...

As the photon passes to the slit, it passes through both and exactly which one it passed through is unknown till it is detected.

sure, the wave, you call photon passes through both slits, the wave has no "size" just periodic ( if any ), the propagation is spherical from the source... a big distance away from the source the front of the wave may be almost flat.
there is no single "particle" going through both slits...
and after the interaction with the charges particles of the slit the wave becomes two waves ( as some of the wave got absorbed by the slit's atoms ) and this wave interact with itself... electric field is an accumulative field.

..it passes through both and exactly which one it passed through is unknown till it is detected.

it is known, at least to me !! ...it passes both slits !!!
until you let one interact with some detector...

so how exactly do you detect a "photon" ( electromagnetic wave with length and form ) ??
you don't !!!
what you can detect is the electron kicked out of an metal ! period!!
you don't measure, you count..
this "measurement" destroys the wave on that one slit, no interaction after...
( eh.. I see it coming, the delayed quantum bums eraser thing... look up my post on that, will not repeat )

This one is a tricky one to really understand or accept.

HA HA HA.. this is exactly the same mind trick like in the quantum field video I have posted

YOU HAVE TO BELIEVE !!


about that video...

@Arbitrageur
the trick goes like this... and this is really abovetopsecret worth

1. you tell people things they may but probably do not know... they think you are smart and know more than they know..

2. you suggest something people want accept without prove.. but they just got smashed by the knowledge you have presented them... so they listen

3. you imply the thing you want them to believe and you say something like..
"We have these theories of physics that are the best theories ever developed, but at the same time they're the theories we understand the least...."
...best theories ever developed, a statement has to be taken as a fact !

people can't wrap they heads about it, but...

4. "You're all made of quantum fields and I don't understand them...at least I don't understand them as well as I think I should."

another statement implying a believe, with an explanation why the listener don't understand.. the "preacher" does it not as well, so it must be complicated, and.... people think, I'm not so stupid ( or he is not so smart ) he does not understand it either..
but it must be true... I think ( believe )


@Arbitrageur

I've never seen you do any quantitative observation fitting. Not only are the EU ideas not expressed quantitatively, but your own ideas are similarly lacking in any kind of quantitative prediction so without that you don't really have anything to compare to observation, and nothing to support that statement that they "they just fit my observations more".

NO ? ... the photoelectric effect, the casimir effect, the slit experiment, I was talking about it in my posts.
what do you want? a video of an experiment ??
show me one from Einstein !

I know, you want math, equations, drownings...

...NO! not till it's done


BTW: Arbitrageur... did you ever said anything by yourself ? how you think "it is", made any new statements ?
you created this thread, and you're answering questions, cool, but it seems, and correct me if I'm wrong, I have to admit I didn't read all you have ever typed here, you always repeat what somebody else said or discovered... nothing wrong with that

I did... I said and I repeat, one charge +1 and one charge -1 is field density 2 of charge 0
I did... photon is just a name not a thing
and I have repeated what I have heard, light do not travel, it propagates...

a reply to: Arbitrageur

Hope this helps.

It's a graph based on the chart.



Pos and neg of (FW) (BW) axis should be (FW) = (+). (BW) = (-). Sorry.

a reply to: blackcrowe
I'll just stick to this one question I asked for now:

Q1. Let's say the first filter is 0 degrees, and the second filter is at 5 degrees. How do I apply your math to calculate how much light passes both filters?

You seem to have given me two different answers which contradict each other. We seem to agree that 50% of the light passes through the first polarizing filter, so let's focus on how much of that passes through the second filter, which is apparently the basis for your table/chart.

Your first answer was 9%. My question was how much light passes but if your answer was how much light was blocked, am I supposed to do the math myself to convert the blocked light to the transmitted light to get the answer to the question I asked?

originally posted by: blackcrowe
a reply to: Arbitrageur

Thanks.

Q1. Lens at 0 deg is removing 50% of (100% of 360) deg the light. eg vert axis.

Lens 2 at 5 deg is removing 5% of (100% of 360 deg.) of (100% of 180) deg of filtered light.

= 9%.

So if I assume you gave the opposite answer (how much was blocked) to what I asked (how much passed), that means you are saying 91% of what passed the first filter will pass the second filter, I'm guessing?

Now I look at your table, and it says something different. Rotation 1-8 degrees is a light loss of 1%.

So that seems to say 99% of what passes the first filter would pass the second filter, doesn't it?

So your two answers don't seem to agree with each other if my attempt to interpret them is correct. Further, I still haven't the faintest idea what any of those numbers has to do with the 12.5% and the -1, 0, and +1 you were talking about here, and I have no idea where you got the conflicting 1% or 9% answers because you didn't really show me any math for those, it seems like they were pulled out of the air?

originally posted by: blackcrowe
a reply to: Arbitrageur

One more point to add.

Lens (0) removes 50% of 100% of 360 deg.

Lens (-1) removes 12.5% of 100% of 180 deg.

Lens (+1) removes 12.5% of 100% of 180 deg.

I can sort of understand "Lens (0) removes 50% of 100% of 360 deg." is supposed to mean something like

"The first filter blocks half the photons" which is what the source I linked for you says happens with the first linear polarizing filter when unpolarized light is passed through it, so we agree on that.

But what's with the "100% of" notation?

"100% of your father's mustache" is "your father's mustache", so why not just say "father's mustache" instead of "100% of father's mustache" where adding "100% of" seems to add no meaning?

I have no idea what the second two lines mean. I don't know what Lens (-1) means, I don't know what Lens (+1) means, I don't know where the 12.5% is coming from, and I don''t know what any of that has to do with the 9% answer you gave me and the 1% conflicting answer you gave me to the same question both of which don't seem to have come from that 12.5% math by any means that I understand.

originally posted by: KrzYma
I know, you want math, equations, drownings...

...NO! not till it's done

So why don't you wait until it's done before burdening us with your statements which have no math or predictive power to back them up?

Meanwhile the world of science and technology marches on with math in abundance which works perfectly well for most science and engineering applications, bar a few unsolved problems like not having good quantum math for what's in a black hole but we seem to get along fine without having that, it's just a matter of theoretical curiosity. It's not like we have a lot of black holes to worry about and I'd just as soon they keep their distance. I don't know if the LHC will ever make a tiny black hole, but even if they do it won't last long.

Since I'm a George Box fan who agrees with his "All models are wrong, some are useful" statement it doesn't faze me in the least if someone tells me mainstream models are wrong since I already assume they are all wrong meaning only nature behaves exactly like nature, no model ever seems to do that and they are at best approximations with limited ranges of applicability. The question is, are the models useful? The answer is, yes they are extremely useful at giving us the right answers unless it's an unsolved problem. If somebody can prove they have a better model that's on the table for evaluation, but that's not going to happen without math so why not just wait until your math is done to tell us how much better your models are than mainstream models? From my perspective, if you have no math you don't even have a model, it's just hot air.

BTW: Arbitrageur... did you ever said anything by yourself ? how you think "it is", made any new statements ?

I think anybody who has an interest in physics gets this warm feeling inside that the world is orderly when seeing how well the classical world follows our intuitive logic, then has the rug pulled out from under them when they learn about the experiments like the double slit, and that as much as we want Einstein to be right that "God doesn't play dice", the evidence keeps piling up that it looks like he was wrong about that. But sure I've had my own ideas and thought the scientists must be overlooking some things, like take dark matter for example. I thought maybe they didn't consider certain things, let's call them A, B, and C, but on digging into their research I find they not only considered A, B, and C, but also D, E, and F and probably a lot more of the alphabet in papers I haven't even read yet, though I've read a number of them. The bullet cluster papers are a must read for people who have doubts, and I even read Moffett's papers saying there is no dark matter and observations can be explained by changing gravity theory.

Ultimately I don't have any better answers to the dark matter mystery which interests me, but it seems like the researchers are doing a good job of researching since they seem to have already thought of the things I thought of that I wasn't sure if they considered. So I find it more than a little annoying when people say mainstream is wrong about dark matter when first, they don't even claim to know what it is so how can saying "I don't know" be wrong? That doesn't even make sense. It's like you misrepresenting what the video you posted said, where you presented the researcher as a know-it-all when in fact he says he doesn't know and doesn't understand things so well. I think your time would be a lot better spent learning real physics than in your amateur attempt at psychoanalyzing how he's manipulating his audience.

What's even more annoying is finding out some people dismissing mainstream science haven't even bothered to research the observations, like when I mention the bullet cluster observations to someone who says dark matter doesn't exist, and they say "bullet cluster? what's that?". People like to say they are thinking outside the box, but when they don't know about the bullet cluster or similar details, they don't even know what's in the box. If you want to think outside the box, that's great, but you have to learn what's inside it first to do that, which some people don't seem to realize. There's so much in the box that most of us don't know all of it.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

Sorry. I am as dyslexic as a dog.

This is very embarrassing. And ruins my life.

I have had my nephew round this evening. He has told me where i was wrong.

Answer to Q1. Again. 47.2% recurring. Light passed. Not lost.

The pic is in my nephews writing. It shows how he got to it.

But if you look at the graph. You find it also.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

Thank you for the nudges.

I needed them.

originally posted by: blackcrowe
a reply to: Arbitrageur

Sorry. I am as dyslexic as a dog.

This is very embarrassing. And ruins my life.

I have had my nephew round this evening. He has told me where i was wrong.

Answer to Q1. Again. 47.2% recurring. Light passed. Not lost.

The pic is in my nephews writing. It shows how he got to it.

But if you look at the graph. You find it also.

I don't follow what your nephew is doing either, but anyway as I said before the math has already been worked out for this simple problem and I don't know why you want to re-invent something we already know that already works. In fact here's an online calculator to give the right answer:

Malus' Law

I put in 100 Watts per square meter of polarized light coming in, and put the filter angle at 5 degrees.

That means whatever watts per square meter come out will also conveniently happen to be percent also, and it says

The Malus' Law calculator computes the intensity of light based on the initial intensity and the angle between the light's initial polarization direction and the axis of the polarizer.

INSTRUCTIONS: Enter the following:

(I0) Initial Intensity
(θ) angle the light's initial polarization direction and the axis of the polarizer

Intensity (I): The calculator returns the intensity in Watts per square meter.
The Math / Science

Malus' Law says that when a perfect polarizer is placed in a polarized beam of light, the intensity, I, of the light that passes through is given by the following equation:

I = I0 • cos²θi

where:

I = Intensity of light based on Malus' Law
I0 = Initial Intensity in W/m2
θi = Angle between the light's initial polarization direction and the axis of the polarizer

99.24038765 W/m^2

So that's 99.240 W/m^2 passes which also means 99.240% passes the second filter if 100 watts entered it, so if 50% is blocked by the first filter the net is 99.240-50= 49.240% passes according to Malus' Law. Or to put in W/m^2, start with 200, get 100 polarized from filter 1 and then 99.24 from filter 2. Since the law assumes "perfect polarizer", actual results will be less since no polarizer is perfect.

But still that doesn't even cover the quantum mechanics phenomenon.

This video is the math video related to the polarizing filters video I posted earlier. The first 10 minutes cover the classical approach and then at 10 minutes it gets into the quantum mechanics.

It's a bit technical for a layman but an engineer should be able to handle most of it, I think, at least the classical first 10 minutes, and hopefully some of the QM after that too.

Some light quantum mechanics

a reply to: Arbitrageur

I've had another look. And scaled down the graph.

The nearest i get is. 48.75%. Gain.

a reply to: blackcrowe
I'm not sure how to interpret that.

Are you saying Malus' Law and/or the online calculator for it are wrong?

If you use the online calculator you should be able to get exactly the same answer I did for "perfect polarizing filters".

The main reason observations will differ from Malus' Law is that no polarizing filters are perfect, but if you know the properties of your polarizing filters you can account for those in a separate calculation. Different filters have different properties, which is why those are not incorporated into Malus' Law.