Physics laser question

Question

A friend and I have randomly thought of an idea we want to ask before we try it. What would happen if we fired a laser through a two-way mirror onto another mirror at the perfect angle to get it to be a stright line. Would the light from the laser go through the two-way and bounce off of the regualr mirror and bounce off the two-way and continue to bounce off each other?

Answer 1

Try it.  I dont have any idea.  but it would be a great thing to try.  I want to hear about it when you do it.  

[e-mail]

please tell me what happens

the doctor

Answer 2

If a laser is fired into a two-way mirror, part of the beam will be transmitted and part of it will be reflected. The transmitted light will then reflect off the regular mirror, and then reach the two-way mirror again, at which point part of it will be transmitted (escape) while the other part will bounce back. The intensity of the beam will diminish with repeated reflections as part of it will be transmitted through the two-way mirror each time that it hits, so that the beam will escape. Do note that since the speed of light is so high, all this takes place almost instantaneously, and it will merely seem that the laser has reflected off the two-way mirror.

Answer 3

A two-way mirror lets some light through and blocks the rest. It doesn't work well if the outside of the mirror is darker than the inside, which is why you always see police investigators in the dark in television and movies.

Some light is reflected so that it doesn't get in, and it is very hard for our eyes to make out anything on the other side of the mirror. However, light does get through or nobody on the other side could see anything outside.

If this laser was fired, some would be blocked from even going through the mirror the first time, and then some would bounce back off the opposing mirror and hit the two-way mirror.

Some would go through it and some of the rest would bounce back, and then it would come back and go partially through until it divided and dissipated itself into nothingness.

If this were some kind of death-ray, I really wouldn't want to be in either room.

Answer 4

Two way mirrors work on the principle that one side of the room is much brighter than the other so that none of the light can be seen coming into the brighter room. Two way mirrors are kind of like overly shiny glass on one side. That doesn't mean that light isn't going back through the other way, just not as much as is being bounced back, so if you mean one pulse that just continues to travel between the two mirrors than no because even if the amount of light that escapes every time it hits the two way mirror is very little, the light would bounce back and forth 100,000,000  times(just a guesstimate) before you could blink and you wouldn't notice anything.

On the other hand if its a continuous beam then yes it should bounce back and forth. but it would still come out the two way mirror.

Answer 5

A two-way mirror, or a half-silvered mirror, same thing, lets through about half the light that strikes it.  So most of the light you fired at the two-way mirror would come straight back at you.  The only losses would be the tiny amount of light absorbed by the ordinary mirror.  Most lasers have an ordinary mirror at one end and a half-silvered mirror at the other end of the lasing material.  The laser beam emerges from the half-silvered mirror.  If you're planning to do this experiment, remember that even a weak laser like 10 mW can damage your eyes because, even though that's about as much light as a torch bulb, it's concentrated in a narrow beam, so wear dark glasses and don't use a powerful beam.