1. Linda is a bank teller and is not active in the feminist movement.
2. Linda is a bank teller and is active in the feminist movement.
If these were the options, then it's entirely possible for option 1 to be less likely than option 2. But the options are actually:
1. Either Linda is a bank teller and active in the feminist movement, or Linda is a bank teller and not active in the feminist movement.
2. Linda is a bank teller and is active in the feminist movement.
Framed this way, anyone can clearly see that option 1 cannot possibly be less likely than option 2, since option 1 includes option 2 as a possibility.
Indeed, even the Wikipedia article describing this problem[1] illustrates this very misconception:
> I am particularly fond of this example [the Linda problem] because I know that the [conjoint] statement is least probable, yet a little homunculus in my head continues to jump up and down, shouting at me—"but she can't just be a bank teller; read the description." - Stephen J. Gould
That homunculus in Gould's head seems to have misread the statements in exactly the same way. Nowhere in statement 1 does it say she is "just" a bank teller. But that's how it naturally reads to most people when placed next to statement 2.
Do most people have a poor understanding of conditional probability? Yes, of course. But I don't really buy that this "Linda problem" illustrates that.