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> just once and it still forms a wave-like interference pattern

That's not a thing. There's no pattern to observe from a single particle.

The situation you're describing doesn't exist.

Wave behavior and interference patterns can only be observed in statistically significant collections of particle interactions. Not single interactions.

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Somewhat reductive. Waves behave differently than classical particles, and we can measure this on the level of individual particles even though we can't image the full pattern with a single measurement. For example: a single particle can end up in the middle of a shadow, but this shouldn't be possible classically.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arago_spot

You do have to assume at some point that if you fire individual electrons through the dual-slits and record their individual results, that the results are independent. If you can assume this, you're drawn to the current model which is that the electron is in a superposition (i.e. "interferes with itself") that when resolved gives the observed statistical outcome of your independent results. This seems also to be the simplest model (there has been 100 years of trying to find simpler models that reproduce these results).

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