Hi Dan, Robert explains this better than me. If you look at the back of a new Veritas blade it will look cloudy due to the randomness of the scratches. The scratches are at the micron level and the back is as perfectly flat as it can be, yet no mirror finish.
The large particles of coarse abrasives will burnish the edges of the scratch and look like a mirror even though there is quite a bit of roughness on the surface.
Scratches in coherent alignment may look mirror like. Incoherent out of alighment scratches on a sub micron level will have a cloudy look.
jtk
"A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."
- Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)