I was looking at two simple circuits. The first had a 100 Voltbattery hooked acr

Question

I was looking at two simple circuits. The first had a 100 Voltbattery hooked across a 20 Ohm resistor. The second took that samebattery, unhooked it from the 20 Ohm resistor and hooked it up to a4 Ohm resistor.

When I did this it thought that 100 divided by 20 is 5...so thatmeans this battery puts out 5 Amps of current. When I hook thatbattery up to the 4 Ohm resistor, the 5 Amps that flow through itwould give a potential difference of 5 times 4...20 Volts. BUT thisdoesnt equal 100. What am i doing wrong???

I'm aware that 100 Volts divided by 4 Ohms gives 25 Amps. The issueis how I'm thinking about the battery. What is am assuming abattery does? What does a battery really do (i.e. what does abattery really provide for the circuit?)

Explanation / Answer

You are thinking wrong. The battery CAUSE the current. No battery , no current. If you hook the battery to another resistor, the current should beequal to V/R1 not V/R0. You can think that the battery make the electron run by act a forceon them. If the battery is no longer connect to the circuit, that mean theelectron can not run anymore, so the current change back tozero.

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