Panicked by Fire Attack

[Maion Maroneios]

there is a record that Syracusians used some unknown war machine that burned roman navy, I think they used mirrors to reflect the sunlight to burn the sails after sails burned so the navy was burned.

I've read that too, and they're called "Fire Mirrors" or something. Supposedly, the mechanism itself was just a collection of various mirrors encircling a big centered one in such a way, that all sun beams that reflected upon the smaller ones concentrated on the central and the concentrated beam hit the enemy ships and set them on fire... I don't really know, but this sounds way too much Sci-Fi to me. I don't even know if that is scientifically possible. I know that, according to the Physics part at least, in order to concentrate sunlight into a beam powerful enough to actually cause damage would require a series of very powerful (and preferably of parabolic shape) lenses that would in turn have to be placed in very specific places in order to get the desired effect.

That leaves me with no option other than dismiss the probability of that story actually holding any truth at all, since AFAIK the Greeks were not as advanced in Geometric Optics as we are today. Not only that, but even if they were they wouldn't be able to burn a ship of more than a few meters away. Why is that, you ask? Because even laser beams aren't as devastating as we believe from a long distance. This is why there can be no laser guns, and that is why the whole "Fire Mirror" story cannot possibly be correct. And why is that exactly? Because even if you concentrate a ray of photons for example (in the case of sunlight), it stays "compact" only for a few meters. After that, the small particles that make up the "beam" will go in different directions and so the energy delivered to a target will not cause any considerable damage like setting it on fire.

Maion