A recent discussion on the confocal listserv reminded me of the very nice section on laser safety in Sam’s Laser FAQ. (link)
A gem is this comparison between the power per unit area (on the retina) of the sun compared to that of a 1mW laser (many laser pointers are stronger than this):
Sun = 0.1 watts/mm2
1mW HeNe laser = 16.7 watts/mm2
Over 167 times the power of the staring at the sun!
And it only gets worse: your Ti:Sapphire laser is outputting 3000 times the average power of that 1mW HeNe. The photo above is what happens to the retina faster than you can blink. Please be careful.
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By the way, 2 square meters of sunlight will melt anything on Earth.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=z0_nuvPKIi8