Can You Explain Quantum Computing Like Justin Trudeau?

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made the remarks during a press briefing at the Perimeter Institute in Waterloo, Ontario, announcing $50 million in funding to continue its world-class cutting-edge research in fundamental physics—including quantum information, a theoretical cornerstone of quantum computing. 

According to physicist Jon Butterworth observed in The Guardian this morning:

It is the kind of thing any sufficiently engaged politician could pick up from a decent briefing, given expert help. Such help is available in abundance at Perimeter, and available anywhere to any suitably senior politician who wants it. Kudos to Trudeau for being clever, interested and confident enough to do this.

We don’t need to understand every last technical nuance, but quantum mechanics has been around for nearly a century now. It’s behind every single piece of modern technology that we now take for granted. Is there really any excuse not to know that light and matter have both particle and wave aspects; that the more you know about a particle’s position, the less you know about its momentum (a.k.a. the Uncertainty Principle); or the alive-and-dead superposition of states at the heart of the Schroedinger’s Cat paradox? And we should certainly know the basics of how our computers work.

Earlier this year, Gizmodo featured a fantastic video of actor Paul Rudd doggedly taking on Stephen Hawking in a game of quantum chess, with a little help from Keanu Reeves, texting from the year 2716. The underlying message: “Anyone can quantum!” It’s not just for really smart people with PhDs.

Our tagline at Gizmodo is “We Come From the Future.” Well, my vision of the future is one where basic scientific literacy is not the exception, but the norm. Justin Trudeau’s impromptu response is a perfect example of what that future could look like. Let’s all do our part to make it happen.

You don't need to be a science student before you can understand science. It's everywhere...even where you're sitted right now.