The Path of Least Resistance

Even very clever people, when talking about things outside their speciality, sometimes get things wrong. I’m reading Professor Mike Orkin’s What Are The Odds? and discover on page 15 this statement:

Just as electricity follows the path of least resistance, chance follows the path of most likely.

Nicely said, but the first clause is just not so. If there are two paths, both with equal voltage applied, then the electricity will take both paths. It will take them in inverse proportion to their resistances. So if one path has a resistance of three ohms and the other six ohms, then twice as much current will flow along the three ohm path as that which flows along the other.

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