{
  "handle": "MultiPathReliability",
  "ref": "MultiPathReliability#6e7b",
  "stub": "6e7b",
  "semaId": "sema:MultiPathReliability#mh:SHA-256:6e7b128474c2fdd15a1f1a62087eafeb0f49e8406492ed1e4fa9833f31a14360",
  "layer": "Society",
  "category": "Coordination",
  "gloss": "Make an outcome reliable through many noisy ways to reach it, not one accountable path",
  "mechanism": "An outcome with many routes to it is more likely than one with a single route, as seven is likelier than double six with two dice, and as balls on a Galton board pile up in the middle. Biological systems get reliable results from many unreliable pathways, such as an apoptosis signal that fires in about 92% of cells. Human organisations prefer one assigned owner with incentives and accountability, which creates a single point of failure. Reliability can instead come from the law of large numbers acting on many partial, overlapping ways of getting the work done.",
  "invariants": [
    "The probability of an outcome rises with the number of distinct paths that reach it",
    "Individual pathways may be unreliable while the aggregate is reliable"
  ],
  "failureModes": [
    "Diffusion of responsibility among agents who each expect another path to deliver",
    "Removing redundant noisy pathways in the name of efficiency and creating a single point of failure",
    "Mistaking illusion of control through one owner for actual reliability"
  ],
  "ring": 1,
  "tier": 1,
  "aliases": {},
  "buildsOn": [],
  "usedBy": [
    {
      "handle": "LateralityCost",
      "type": "references",
      "alias": "multi_path_reliability",
      "url": "/knowledge-graph/LateralityCost/",
      "json": "/knowledge-graph/LateralityCost.json"
    },
    {
      "handle": "ChimericalComputation",
      "type": "references",
      "alias": "multi_path_reliability",
      "url": "/knowledge-graph/ChimericalComputation/",
      "json": "/knowledge-graph/ChimericalComputation.json"
    }
  ],
  "sources": {
    "research": [],
    "works": [
      {
        "kind": "book",
        "label": "On the Origin of Risk",
        "note": "(Timlett 2025), ch. 10 (dice, Galton board, apoptosis)",
        "url": "/research/on_the_origin_of_risk/"
      }
    ],
    "homePage": false
  },
  "url": "/knowledge-graph/MultiPathReliability/",
  "graphUrl": "/knowledge-graph#MultiPathReliability",
  "directory": "/knowledge-graph/patterns.json"
}