Is there a word for the action of moving through the easiest path? I've found "desire path" or "trail blazing", which comes close to the concept I'm looking for, but it lacks any amount of poetry. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
To give context, I'm a physicist working with my team on publishing work that strongly revolves around paths of least resistance. None of us are necessarily experts in the field of English and are hoping to describe new principles in a way that doesn't require saying "the path of least resistance transition principle" or "the path of least resistance gravitation principle."
Best Answer
The OP, who is a physicist, asks:
I suggest the primrose path, which comes from Shakespeare. A problem with my answer is immediately obvious in the last six words in this definition from Wikipedia:
If I knew how to put the last six words in tiny type, I would have. But physicists have had no problem with co-opting English words and assigning completely different meanings to them: color, charm, flavor. Thus, I see no reason why the OP physicist could not co-opt the primrose path and change its meaning to omit the bad consequences of tripping along it.
From The Phrase Finder