Editing Openai/6897769e-4ee4-800f-aba5-69cca34f701c (section)

==== When you detect a photon (photoelectric effect, avalanche photodiode, SNSPD, PMT, trapped-ion fluorescence), the detector must absorb the photon and dump its energy into electronic degrees of freedom. That’s why the clicks are discrete. This is textbook in the photoelectric effect and in modern single-photon detectors (SNSPDs, etc.). strangepaths.com<ref>{{cite web|title=strangepaths.com|url=https://strangepaths.com/the-quantum-eraser-experiment/2007/03/20/en/|publisher=strangepaths.com|date=2007-03-20|access-date=2025-12-16}}</ref> ====

Even more telling, experiments literally watch quantum jumps (sudden emission/absorption events) in real time — in atoms/ions and in superconducting qubits. These are the “boundary events” in your language:
* Classic trapped-ion/atom quantum-jump observations (1986) show bright/dark periods from single-photon emission. empossible.net<ref>{{cite web|title=empossible.net|url=https://empossible.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Lecture-2-Lorentz-and-Drude-models.pdf|publisher=empossible.net|access-date=2025-12-16}}</ref>brucesherwood.net<ref>{{cite web|title=brucesherwood.net|url=https://brucesherwood.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Refraction.pdf|publisher=brucesherwood.net|access-date=2025-12-16}}</ref>
* Cavity QED resolves “quantum jumps of light” — photon number changing inside a cavity. physics.byu.edu<ref>{{cite web|title=physics.byu.edu|url=https://physics.byu.edu/faculty/colton/docs/phy442-winter20/lecture-11-lorentz-oscillator-model.pdf|publisher=physics.byu.edu|access-date=2025-12-16}}</ref>
* “Catch and reverse a quantum jump mid-flight” (Nature 2019) shows you can predict a jump and even interrupt it — exactly the level of control you’d expect if an event is a real, indivisible action. astro1.panet.utoledo.edu<ref>{{cite web|title=astro1.panet.utoledo.edu|url=https://astro1.panet.utoledo.edu/~ljc/PE_eng.pdf|publisher=astro1.panet.utoledo.edu|access-date=2025-12-16}}</ref>De Gruyter Brill<ref>{{cite web|title=De Gruyter Brill|url=https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/nanoph-2020-0186/html?lang=en&srsltid=AfmBOooJp1RuuLpyFP83nJyRCFU8mIPML_LGW-2f6g1MwJrSAclGWKDt|publisher=De Gruyter Brill|access-date=2025-12-16}}</ref>

Take-home: In particle-like experiments, detection = absorption; emission events are observable; the discreteness is not optional.