if tat me programming often involves examining set of conditions and deciding which action to take based on those conditions python' if statement allows you to examine the current state of program and respond appropriately to that state in this you'll learn to write conditional testswhich allow you to check any condition of interest you'll learn to write simple if statementsand you'll learn how to create more complex series of if statements to identify when the exact conditions you want are present you'll then apply this concept to listsso you'll be able to write for loop that handles most items in list one way but handles certain items with specific values in different way