this post was submitted on 29 Aug 2023
676 points (97.9% liked)

xkcd

8791 readers
166 users here now

A community for a webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
koraro
676
xkcd #2821: Path Minimization (startrek.website)
submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by [email protected] to c/xkcd
41 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Link to comic: https://xkcd.com/2821/

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[โ€“] 6mementomori 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I'd add to this that, if I'm not mistaken, it's because light takes all possible paths and the average measured time is longer

[โ€“] crossover 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

The probability of a path it takes is the sum of all possible paths. Richard Feynman uses this exact swimmer in the water example during one of his lectures of physics.