The statistics

[frankinstein]

Hello,

I got a question regarding the probability amplitudes of polarization. Say you rotate the polarization amplitudes to 45% so the photons that pass through a filter have 50% probabilty of vertical or horizontal polarization. Is that 50% probabilty much like the probabilty of say throwing coins in the air? Meaning yes the probability of each coin being heads or tails is 50% but upon counting the actual result for each trial of sets of coins you can get more or less of heads or tails, but after many trials it averages out to 50%?

Frank

[sweet springs]

Hi. It seems you are right.
Regards.

[Meir Achuz]

If it is ordinary classical light with a huge of photons, you would get half intensity with a vertical polarizer after the 45 degree polarizer.
If there is only one photon going through the system for each measurement, then it will be 50% probability for each measurement, like the flipped coin.