All the same, the mere existence of even the most rudimentary of quantum computers demonstrates that quantum mechanics has moved far beyond being a language to describe an esoteric world that most people never encounter. The use of quantum mechanics to improve information technology supplies one of the most compelling demonstrations that it really does describe something real about the world. The significance goes deeper, however. The very idea of treating quantum systems as repositories of information, which can be stored, manipulated and read out just as it can using the digital circuitry of
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