Category Archives: math

Anything mathematical.

## Image factorisation in abelian categories

Let $R$ be a ring and $f:B\to C$ be a morphism of $R$-modules. The image of $f$ is of course $${\rm im}(f) = \{ f(x) : x\in B \}.$$The image of $f$ is a submodule of $C$. It is pretty much self-evident that $f$ factors as $$B\xrightarrow{e} {\rm im}(f)\xrightarrow{m} C$$where $e$ is a surjective homomorphism […]

## Art vs. science in mathematical discovery

Is mathematics science or art? Mathematics resembles science. In math, data and examples are collected and hypotheses made. There is a difference in the hypotheses of math versus science: in the former they can be proved, but that could be considered a small point. But I have met mathematicians who don't consider themselves scientists, and […]

## A little intro to the Jacobi symbol: Part 3

This is the final post on the Jacobi symbol. Recall that the Jacobi symbol $(m/n)$ for relatively prime integers $m$ and $n$ is defined to be the sign of the permutation $x\mapsto mx$ on the ring $\Z/n$. In the introductory post we saw this definition, some examples, and basic properties for calculation purposes. In Part […]

## A little intro to the Jacobi symbol: Part 2

In the last post, we examined the Jacobi symbol: for two relatively prime integers $m$ and $n$, we defined the Jacobi symbol $(m/n)$ to be the sign of the permutation $x\mapsto mx$ on the ring $\Z/n$. It turns out that the Jacobi symbol plays a part in the theory of quadratic residues. For a number […]

## A little intro to the Jacobi symbol: Part 1

If $m$ and $n$ are relatively prime integers, the Jacobi symbol $(m/n)$ is defined as the sign of the permutation $x\mapsto mx$ on the set $\Z/n$. Let's give a simple example: $(7/5)$. The permutation on $\{1,2,3,4\}$ is given by $(1 2 4 3) = (1 2)(2 4)(4 3)$ which has an odd number of transpositions. […]

## Injective and p-injective

An $R$-module $M$ is called injective if the functor $\Hom_R(-,M)$ is exact. The well-known Baer criterion states that an $R$-module $M$ is injective if and only if for every ideal $I$ of $R$, every map $I\to M$ can actually be extended to a map $R\to M$. For example, $\Q$ is an injective $\Z$-module. If every […]

## Sums of reciprocals of divisors, perfect numbers

A perfect number is a positive integer $n$ such that $$\sum_{d|n} d = 2n.$$Put another way, $n$ is the sum of its proper divisors. Check out a a quick intro to perfect numbers that I wrote last November. The first three perfect numbers are $6, 28,$ and $496$. Currently, the largest perfect number, corresponding to […]

## Ideal in a union of ideals

Suppose $I$ is an ideal in a ring $R$ and $J,K$ are ideals such that $I\subseteq J\cup K$. Then either $I\subseteq J$ or $I\subseteq K$. Indeed, suppose that there is some $x\in I$ such that $x\not\in J$. If $y\in I$ is arbitrary and $y\not\in K$ then $x + y$ is in neither $J$ nor $K$. […]

## Sum of squares a square?

The sum of squares of two integers can be an integer. For example, $3^2 + 4^2 = 25^2$. Those are also the legs of a right-angle triangle. This example is special in that the numbers $3$ and $4$ are consecutive integers! Can you find a sum of squares of three consecutive integers that make a […]