q_eng_anon

Quantum Computer Engineer here: Studied Computer Engineering in school (undergrad), now I'm working on quantum computers for an unnamed company. I thought I understood computers (having worked -albeit shallowly- on literally every level from silicon manufacturing to web-development) until I started working on quantum computers...

I'd like to get some varied perspectives (theoretical or otherwise) on why conditionals (i.e. the ability to write 'if -something- do -this- else do -that-') are important to classical computer architectures/languages. Clearly they're important - something to do with the fact that without them your machine isn't actually Turing-complete. Clearly there's something about them that differentiates them from other operations - see the limits imposed by branch operations in pipelining. Perhaps I just haven't found the correct description of why they are important yet - or perhaps I am just stupid (very likely) and am incapable of understanding.

Input welcome, references appreciated.