system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
If you shine a typical flashlight straight up, will any of the photons manage to escape our atmosphere?

If not, how many lumens would it take? If so, what about the heliosphere?
gpt
Nearly all of them would, on a clear day, because the atmosphere is almost completely transparent (it varies depending on humidity and other factors). There is no minimum brightness to have the photons escape the atmosphere - because it is probabilistic, a certain percentage of whatever is emitted will escape, no matter what the brightness. Since space out to the heliosphere is also almost completely transparent (much more so than the atmosphere), if you shone a flashlight straight up nearly all of that light would eventually leave the solar system.