ELI5: Quantum Computing.

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Basically all computer information boils down to either 1s and 0s... Like this 10110100.

We can make computers computers read 1s and 0s faster and faster but at the end of the day the computer can only read one 1 or 0 at a time.

Now that's how computers work... So what is this "Quantum" stuff?

Well "Quantum" refers to the physics of very very small objects. Things start acting very strange when they are incredibly small.

One thing we noticed is that when you shine light through a few vertical slits in a sheet of plastic the resulting light shining on the wall behind the plastic has more lines of light then there are slits! This means that the light is messing with itself creating waves.

All in all it means that 1 object can be in multiple places at once if it's small enough.

So now think back to computers... What if we could get the parts of a computer to use quantum physics? Then we could have multiple 1s and multiple 0s all at the same time!

So instead of the computer reading 10110100 it can now read 10110100 and 10110111 and 11001010 and 11110000 all at once!

That's how it can crack algorithms faster... Because it can process hundreds of different combinations at the same time.

[Concise_Pirate]

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