Dear Doc,
I'm taking a bit of a break, I have a low saturation point, but look in on a few things. Analysis of Aspect type 'photon' experiments opens the classical vs. Quantum can of worms, and either way is structured on the premise that the Planck quanta is indivisibly a fundamental energy action quantity, and a lot of times theoretically taken only as the energy term instead of erg sec.
Constantinos Ragazas presents strong arguments to support the case that the 'quanta' itself is in reality an empirical experimentally derived; least observable average. I haven't digested it enough to comment ontologically, but at present think it must go to co-incidence of the hyberbolic function Minkowski identified with Lorentz and the parabolic function of the natural exponential function, which is observed when the EM wave is 'stopped' in an absorption event with a relative rest entity in the atomic structure on a detection device. His conclusions are quite disruptive of both Classical and Quantum, because he shows that it is the rapidity trigometrically in any wave that distinguishes the frequency in a continuous flow of energy and that a range of energy content can be carried in any given frequency, which averaged over is what theoretically we ascribe to a 'photon' experimentally.
So without a rational waveform that we can differentiate as a single wave of specific energy/frequency, and without reliance on the 'quanta' as a matter of expedience lacking source rationale, as we now do with the post hoc/proctor hoc assumption of the quantum leap, Aspect experiments have to be treated with a skepticism you'd find in any towny bar. It's a trick bulb. Now, cutting a deck to pull an Ace, IS simple physics!
If you have time, you (and others) might like to take a look at a Master's Thesis on Rubidium experiments, cited by Steven Sax, by Amir Waxman which can be found at: http://www.bgu.ac.il/atomchip/Theses/Amir_Waxman_MSc_2007.pdf
What is found is that staged half-pulses of laser light produce a discretized photon result in the target Rubidium atom. But what may be of interest in your arguments and to distinguish measure systems between Q & C, is that in their protocols the Waxman group specifies 'free precession' but which in the co-ordinate system called 'spin', the axis of precession intersects with the intersection origin of the orthogonal. That does not allow +1,-1 antipodes on the sphere surface to float as is observable in free precession of the wobble of the N&S magnetic poles of the earth, which tracks an ideal axis that does not intersect 'dead sphere center'. Natural precession in a particle can not be constrained to a hypothetical symmetry of an abstract measurement scheme.
The sun just came out, I'm going to do some messy yard work so I can focus on something that doesn't need much, and so I won't get in the way of what's floating around in my head. I need the well-being of being physical, too. best-jrc
