Eli5 Why can’t we “know” the speed and position of an electron simultaneously? Why can we only measure one of these properties at a time?

Question

This always confuses me and I’m not sure how it works. Please explain…

In: 252

Answer 1

The more concentrated a wave is in one spot, the harder it is to define what its frequency is. And the easier it is to define its frequency, the more spread out the wave is. That’s it. It’s a basic mathematical property of waves.

People really overthink this one and sometimes view it as something almost mystical, but it’s incredibly simple and almost obvious.