Pathway Independent

Definition

Pathway independent refers to variables or quantities whose values do not depend on how they were achieved but only on the initial and final states.

Analogy

Consider your bank balance. Whether you earned money through a job, received it as a gift, or found a treasure chest full of gold, what matters is how much money you have now (the end state), not how you got it (the path).

Related terms

Potential Energy: This is pathway independent because it depends only on an object's position relative to other objects.

Pressure: In physics and chemistry, pressure is considered pathway independent as it relies solely on force per unit area at any given moment.

Volume: Another example of pathway independent property in thermodynamics. It doesn't matter how the volume was achieved; all that matters is its current value.