explaining OR gates in a way I understand with circuits

This is incorrect. When you press the push button, one (or both) of the inputs are disconnected from everything and so EveryCircuit doesn’t know what the voltage at that input is. As such, it grays out the OR gate to show that it stopped simulating it because it can’t simulate it when one of its inputs has an undefined voltage. To fix this, add a pull-down resistor, which is a resistor connected to ground to force the input of a logic gate to 0V when said input is otherwise disconnected instead of letting it “float” when disconnected which can lead to unpredictable behavior in real life. Also, for ease of understanding, I recommend having one OR gate with both inputs having a pull-down resistor and also connected to a 5V source through a switch (not a button) so that you can change each input individually and not have to hold down a button to keep supplying voltage.

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