ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Multidimensional sampling

Imagine we have a box of different colored toys. Now, if we were to pick one toy from the box, it's straightforward - we just pick one toy. But what if we wanted to pick two toys at once? We can't do that with just our hands, so we would need something else to help us.

This is where multidimensional sampling comes in. It means picking things from a box or set of items, but instead of just picking one, we pick multiple things at the same time, like two or three or more! It might sound tricky, but there is a simple way to do this - we use a table!

In this table, we write down all the different options we have for each item we want to pick. So, for example, let's say we want to pick two toys from the box, we can first make a list of all the different colors of toys in the box. Let's say we have red, blue, and green toys.

Now, we can make a table that has one column for the first toy we pick and another column for the second toy we pick. In each column, we put all the different colors of toys we could pick. So, in both columns, we write down red, blue, and green.

Then, we can pick one color from the first column and one color from the second column. We'll end up with all the different combinations of two toys we could pick. For example, we could pick a red toy and a blue toy, or a blue toy and a green toy, or even two green toys!

This process can be extended to more than two dimensions, where we can pick three, four, or even more items at the same time! With multidimensional sampling, we can explore all the different possibilities and pick things in a more efficient way with the help of a table.