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12:14 AM
Good night, @Mike.
 
I figure when I start drinking I should be free to come in here, @Ted.
But maybe that philosophy will just make me an alcoholic :)
You're awful red today @Stan.
 
12:35 AM
Yup, although it suggests you're past Balarka's bedtime.
 
Suppose I have a system of equations. It's big - say, 16 equations in 12 variables. All eqns and variables are real. Is there an algorithmic way to find if there's a solution?
This computer business is awful hard.
 
12:52 AM
@MikeMiller So I am! I am the SE chameleon in residence
 
@MikeMiller what does it mean for an equation to be "real"?
 
real coefficients
 
so you know something about the equations
for there to be coefficients
 
I mean, I'm asking for an algorithm to calculate whether or not there's a solution to the system of equations. This means I have actual honest to god equations with actual honest to god coefficients to plug into this algorithm.
 
what do your equations look like?
 
1:01 AM
too big, now that I just checked one
 
linear, polynomial?
contrived functions designed to make this undecidable?
 
they're polynomial equations.
in any case, this isn't workable
 
that's not fun
 
Hello!!

How could we find x such that
(37 * 34 +72* 5)*x=84 *34+76 * 5
without using a calculator?
Does the prime factorization help?
Or is the only way to calculate the products and additions?
 
hello
 
1:21 AM
Hi @John :-)
 
@MaryStar Yes, there is a clever way to do it.
@JohnSheridan Your message is out of place here, as it is lacking in mathematical content. :D
 
Could you give me a hint how the clever looks like? The prime factorisation doesn't really help, right? At the one side we would have the primes 17 and 37 and at the other side the prime 19.
What else could we do?
@KarlKronenfeld
 
@MaryStar Consider what you'd do if all you had to find was the first digit of $x$.
 
First of all dividing by 2 we get the equation $(37 \cdot 17 +36 \cdot 5)x=84 \cdot 17 + 38 \cdot 5 $.
To find the first digit of a number do we not find the remainder of the division of x and 10? @KarlKronenfeld
 
that's the least significant digit of a whole number. I am suggesting instead finding the most significant digit of a decimal like 1.618
 
1:33 AM
Hmmm.... How could we do that? I got stuck right now... @KarlKronenfeld
 
Well, viewing it as a decimal may not be prudent in the end... you're working with a fraction p/q.
I am simply asking how many times q goes into p
I am out of hints after this remark though; I'd just give away the answer
 
Euclidean algorithm, @Karl?
 
@KhallilBenyattou kinda sorta reminiscent of that
 
so do we have to calculate the equation modulo q? @KarlKronenfeld
@KarlKronenfeld At which numbers do we use the Euclidean algorithm?
 
working modulo q is the wrong idea here, from my perspective of course
 
1:42 AM
The euclidean algorithm is the following:
a=b*q1+r1
b=q2*r1+r2
r1=r2*q3+r3
...
right?
what a and b do we take in this case? @KarlKronenfeld
 
1:53 AM
Or am I on the wrong track? @KarlKronenfeld
 
2:38 AM
Hi @Ted.
 
3:17 AM
Hi @Mike, @Stan, @Ted, rest of chat. :D
 
Morning.
 
Hi @Fargle ... Regoodnight @MikeM
 
3:27 AM
Do you watch soccer, @Ted?
 
USWNT!!!!!!
Hell^yes
 
I didn't realize it before but I've met Julie Johnstone before. Graduated my undergrad the year before I did.
 
It was quite a stomping we gave them.
 
Whatttttt?
 
3:34 AM
("We.")
 
Someone pointed this out to me about an hour ago. Oops.
 
What is this given by H = ?
got by setting
 
Thats unreal
There is this kid who went to my middle/junior high school and when Messi came to the States, he saw this kid playing and got off of the bus to talk to him cuz he liked his skills
 
Hey, I'm from the codegolf site, and I posted a problem a while ago that seems to have stumped people, so I'm looking to find an approach here
given a set of points along the perimeter of a square, determine the rotation of the square
or if the rotation is impossible or unknown
 
@Karim: what kind of object do the $H_{\lambda}$s represent? I'm not familiar with the notation of representations.
 
3:38 AM
its a * homomorphism between C* algebra A and B(H)
 
@Fargle that's not the notation of representations, it's the notation of an "indexed family" of things
 
for example the pair (H,$\phi$) is morphism $\phi: A \rightarrow B(H)$
 
unless you're wondering why there are two things ($H$ and $\varphi$) that make up a representation - that means $H$ is the actual space and $\varphi$ the map out of $A$
 
@anon No, I know what an indexed family is, I was specifically referring to what $H_\lambda$ is in the context of $(H_{\lambda}, \phi_{\lambda})$
 
3:40 AM
some physicists might call it the "carrier space"
 
And what does $B(H)$ denote? (Sorry, I'm in over my head here, but I'd like to at least learn from it)
 
often representation theorists will refer to a representation by a homomorphism $\varphi$ or a space $H$ interchangeably (this is pretty abusive for newcomers)
 
Bounded operators on $H$, some Hilbert space, probably.
 
@Fargle think of it as GL(H), but more manageable linear maps if H is infinite-dimensional
 
Gotcha.
 
3:42 AM
@StanShunpike Wasn't everyone saying just two weeks ago that they had no chance whatsoever of winning the tournament?
 
You take the direct sum of all those Hilbert spaces with the induced inner product. This will usually not be complete. Take the completion. That's the Hilbert space direct sum.
That's what $\oplus_\lambda H_\lambda$ refers to here.
 
I see
 
@RandomVariable Not in America.
 
so what for example is a positive functional on C* algebra
I understand that a linear functional is just a mapping from the vector space to its scalar field
 
You should find a good book on C* algebras. That will be more effective than asking chat when you run into an unfamiliar notion.
 
3:47 AM
yeah
do you recommend a book on it @MikeMiller ?
 
I learned from "C* algebras by example". I don't know any other ones. If you're working with a faculty member you should ask them for advice.
 
@Fargle After reading some articles on the ESPN website about two weeks ago, I got the impression that the American media was down on them too.
 
Media, maybe. The attitude among my peers has been one of good old American exceptionalism.
 
okay thank you
 
@RandomVariable no. They said the defense was playing lights out and the offense was in a rut. They were dominant today but still played kinda crappy. Carli Lloyd just had a monster day and put the team on her back. That midfield shot was crazy.
But they could have lost at various points in the tournament. But with a team like the US, they always have a chance usually
 
4:06 AM
@anon did you figure out the thing with mapping class groups?
i don't remember what the thing was, but i remember that there was a thing
 
something to do with H a closed lie subgroup of G
 
i don't think that was it
that's also probably unfair to dump on you. the result you want there is that when $H$ is a closed subgroup of $G$, $G/H$ has a natural manifold structure such that $G \to G/H$ is a submersion
 
well, I'm content as far as the braids / mapping classes thing is concerned
 
then a theorem about the local structure of submersions let's you pull out a section of that
ok, i think it was related to that. woo
 
@StanShunpike I just watched a replay of that goal. Wow.
 
4:18 AM
@anon: if you cared, it seems like there's just absolutely not a general theory (even in the weakest sense) of representations of finitely presented groups. when you get past, like, two generators and one small relator, it becomes impossible to check in the obvious way that there's a nontrivial representation
 
huh
 
so anything one can do in the cases i care about have to very carefully exploit what's special about my situation
 
4:32 AM
the guy who wrote C* algebras by example taught me calculus 1
he occasionally chats with me when he sees me studying on campus
 
good book, though i found it a bit frustrating
had to work pretty hard at it
 
I can imagine it's tough stuff
the only thing I really know about it is that good old kenny d is the author
 
there were just lots of details not supplemented. it was one of those things where i found it difficult to supplement the details myself
 
I have to guess that the subject is/was still a little rough around the edges in general
 
nah, it's been around for a long time
the basics of that stuff was settled way back, and then lots of the more interesting stuff was done starting in the 70s
i think his book was published mid90s?
 
4:42 AM
I was looking at a copy of the preface just now and yeah that looks right
but like, is 20ish years enough time to sand it down from the new work in the 70's?
 
@RandomVariable the crazy part wasnt just the shot but also how that was (1) her 3rd goal and (2) 16 minutes into the game. I was having flashbacks to the Brazil vs Germany game m.youtube.com/watch?v=Oo2_yFv1kmQ
 
yeah, it really is
 
well alrighty then
 
hartshorne's book was originally published mid-70s i think? which was less than 20 years after grothendieck's algebraic geometry revolution
 
I haven't read it so I can't speak to how well it does its job
but people have told me that it itself is quite rough in some parts
 
4:47 AM
there's some debate about that but it's been the standard text for a very long time
 
well, just because it's a standard text doesn't mean it's good. it just means that there likely isn't anything better
or even that it's just sort of locked in by tradition
 
fair enough
 
I really do want to learn some good algebraic geometry at some point, I have to wonder what it's all about
 
What would these be qualifying exams for ? Getting into grad school? math.wisc.edu/~passman/algquals.html
 
qualifying exams are tests you take in grad school. you need to pass them by some date (you have some number of tries) to, well, stay in the program
they're usually a prerequisite to doing more interesting things
 
4:56 AM
Oh okay, thanks for that. Do you take them periodically or once off?
 
the specifics depend on the school. you could probably find out about wisconsin's qualifying exam system on the school's website
once you pass you're done
at UCLA advisors (often) won't work with you until you've passed your qualifying exams, since you need to be studying for those instead of doing research, and they usually test fundamentals any researcher in the field should know
 
That seems logical
 
5:09 AM
I'm planning the last week of a 5 week (very basic; essentially remedial algebra) class, and I'm considering a bonus question (I've had random bonus questions each test).
I'll tell the students in advance that the bonus question will be deriving the quadratic formula (we will go over completing the square and the formula, separately, in class). The hard version (more points) will be for $ax^2 + bx + c = 0$, the easy version (less points) $x^2 + bx + c = 0$.
Am I crazy, or is this actually not a bad idea?
 
seems like your students could get the general one immediately from the not-so-general one
i would bet that most do eithier the more points one or don't do it at all
 
Ah, I had planned on making it an "either-or" deal, because plenty of students are not terribly skilled
You've got to remember, this ain't UCLA we're talking about ;)
 
admittedly i'm not very good at telling what people's skill levels are at this sort of thing
 
That's exactly it! I figure I'm covering my bases, if I have the two versions from which they choose (at most) 1. And they have time to work on it in advance, to gauge their own skill
Because really, I just want them to learn "completing the square", that's my ulterior motive - but they'll think of it purely in terms of bonus points.
But, who knows, I don't know why I was looking for confirmation. How's summer treating you, @MikeMiller?
 
it's alright. in vancouver for a conference this week; then I go back to LA to put together my new IKEA legos; then I need to prep for the probability class I'm TAing in august
i'm mostly looking forward to the legos
 
5:25 AM
Legitimately IKEA legos, or are you just anticipating some weird furniture instructions?
 
nah it's just furniture
 
I was wondering the same thing
 
but I've always had fun putting together IKEA stuff
it's like small lego sets, but bigger and sweatier
2
 
It's true! We recently bought a grill that will need minor assembly; it'll be quite fun
 
I get to build a whole bedroom
hashtag psyked
 
5:30 AM
Damn! You must have happened upon quite the windfall inheritance; a whole room!
 
nah, I'm just moving
my last place was furnished
 
That's fun, at least you're past the "moving out" part, which is the worst
 
absolutely. all my stuff's there (in boxes), which will be a pain, but it's better than the packing it all UP part
 
Indeed, and if you're like me, the dream that it'll stay organized once unpacked is still alive.
 
haha, like my boxes are organized
at least two are just 'well i've got all this other stuff i didn't put anywhere...'
 
5:35 AM
That's going to be my box collection next move; we finally stayed at a place for more than a year
 
who's we? (and I hope 'next move' isn't too soon)
 
My girlfriend and I. 'next move' is indeterminate, I'll definitely be in Akron for the next academic year, but ideally I'll have found a PhD program that accepts me, faults and all, for the following fall.
 
hi @MikeMiller
I have come up with a brief "book of analogies" for covering spaces vs. galois theory. wanna hear?
fix some galois ext $L/k$. "points" - inclusion $L \hookrightarrow \bar{k}$, "paths" - morphisms $\bar{k} \to \tilde{k}$ between alg. closures, "fiber" over the point $k \hookrightarrow \bar{k}$ - either $\text{Hom}_k(L, \bar{k})$ or $L \otimes_k \bar{k}$ (haven't figured out which). "fundamental groupoid" - category $\mathsf{Gal}$ with objects being alg. closures and morphisms being isomorphisms between them.
 
5:52 AM
sorry about that, @pjs36 - internet died
good luck with all that :) and goodnight!
 
night, @Mike
 
No worries at all, take care Mr. @MikeMiller!
I like your analogies, @BalarkaSen, but I am supremely unqualified to comment on any of it.
 
don't worry, @pjs36. I happen to be similarly unqualified too, thus I am showing to to everybody to make sure it works, haha.
didn't go to school today, @Soham?
 
nah. back pain.
because I have to take all my books to school.
 
oh. it's off today in my school, I just heard.
 
5:59 AM
you? won't go yet?
what's off?
 
my school.
 
ah. have you planned to not go to school at all? :P
 
I have went to school a couple of days the previous week.
just didn't go this week, as I was ill.
today's off, so that's bonus.
what're you planning to do today, @Soham?
 
group actions
cool stuff
 
sure. they're a language to put almost all of algebra in the same style.
 
6:04 AM
usually half of my work is over by this time, unlike you. :P
but I had to go to the tailor to get myself measured for a new set of school trousers.
 
you'll see group actions pop up on group theory, module/vector space theory, galois theory, representation theory (something I don't know).
group actions make Cayley's theorem almost a tautology.
 
rep theory is another thing I'm curious about. it has a bunch of physics applications. (I've heard)
I may be Mr. Category Theory (Paul's appellation) but I'm a sucker for cool applications. :P
@BalarkaSen yeah, pretty psyched about learning actions.
 
cool.
 
shower. toodles.
 
6:48 AM
@r9m hi pal
(^_^)/
 
7:46 AM
Hello, please what is the good $v_0\in H^1_0(0,1)$ such that $\int_0^1 a(t) v_0^2(t) dt>||v_0||^2_{H^1_0}$ ? please
where $a\in L^1$
 
 
1 hour later…
8:46 AM
@Balarka, you're a LOTR fan?
 
r9m
9:01 AM
@skillpatrol (^_^)/ hey there!!
 
@Balarka, @bananas: here's our friend RB talking about "masterclasses" he's given :P
11
Q: Algebraic topology in high school?

Sasha PatotskiThis winter I am planning on teaching a small seminar (20 lectures 45 minutes each) for high school students. I was was given the freedom to choose the topic of the seminar, but it is supposed to be about some "advanced" mathematics in an elementary exposition. I was thinking about lecturing on ...

 
r9m
how do I wave the right hand? when I use the left slash ... it vanishes for some reason ..
 
same thing happens here.
I think it is for LaTeX
 
@SohamChowdhury I am, indeed.
 
r9m
I was watching Rurouni Kenshin anime series (started watching this morning) :) sorry for the late reply @skill
 
9:06 AM
np pal :-)
 
@SohamChowdhury It was a perfectly relevant post, though.
No mention of T&G for one.
Not even crossed complexes and double groupoids.
 
r9m
I wonder what's up with 16+ upvotes on this one -_- .. its obvious or am I the one making some mistake? (I didn't sleep last night)
 
@r9m I was asking the same question..
anyway nice answer, I like the second one.
 
r9m
@Gato I answered it while it was 11+ or sth like that (I was naturally attracted to the high nectar content of the flower like a bee :P)
nyway .. back to anime BBL
 
@r9m :D, just one question at then end when you applied the maximum modulus it's '$\{\vert z\vert=r\}=\{\vert z\vert\le r\}$'
right ? Because you write $<$
 
r9m
9:15 AM
@Gato right!! thanks!! :-)
 
@r9m no problem :), I don't understand "ack to anime BBL".
 
r9m
@Gato I was watching Rurouni Kenshin (anime)
 
hm okay.
@r9m I have seen a beautiful result as an exercise : Let $f$ be analytic and bounded in the right half plane $\Re(z)>0$. The result is that the series $\sum_{n=1}^\infty \Re(\frac{1}{z_n})$ is convergent, where $z_1,z_2,z_3,\cdots$ are the zeros of $f$ is this half plane.
 
r9m
@Gato I see .. nice :)
 
10:00 AM
why didn't you tell me? :)
also, that might've been before he started writing T&G. Tell me, have you ever seen Hatcher's point-set notes?
I'm thinking of doing the ~40 problems from there once I'm done with quotient spaces.
 
I didn't feel it was relevant. You've read LOTR?
@Soham No, I have never seen Hatcher's point-set notes.
Link me.
nevermind, I googled and found it. had a look, it's pretty cool. I'd expect the exercises to be hard.
 
 
1 hour later…
11:19 AM
@BalarkaSen yeah. it was the awesomest 10th birthday gift one could ask for. The Children of Húrin is cool too.
Peter Jackson's films are the only film adaptations of any book I've ever liked.
@BalarkaSen hmm. should be fun.
 
@SohamChowdhury I've heard bad things about the film.
LOTR is good.
I hope to read The Silmarillion someday.
It's about the first and second age of the middle earth, I think. LOTR doesn't say anything much about the first age except a bit about Morgoth and breaking of Thagorodrim.
anyway, these are off-topic here. :P
 
@Balarka done with the proof.....
Is it fine if I take a function with the properties you mentioned
 
11:44 AM
cool, show me the proof, @Remember.
 
@Balarka If I just take a function according to the properties does that satisfy the proof ?
 
yes, the point is that you have to pick a path, i.e., choose a continuous function $f : [0, 1] \to X$ with $f(0) = x_0$ and $f(1) = x_1$, given $x_0, x_1 \in X$.
@Rememberme well, yes, like I mentioned above. but I am not sure how else you can prove it.
the whole point is to pick such a function.
 
So the function is :
$f(x)=x(x_1-x_0)+x_0$
Sorry if it is wrong
 
change $x$ to $t$ please. you should be sure of whether you are right or not before posting something, btw.
but you are right, yes.
 
I feel I am sure but.. still if you can check...@Balarka
Okhay......
What was the next interesting thing you were about to tell me @Balarka
 
11:49 AM
this is the geometrical translation : for any pair $x_0, x_1$ in $\Bbb R^2$, you take the straight line $f : [0, 1] \to \Bbb R^2$ given by $t \mapsto tx_1 + (1 - t)x_0$ joining $x_0$ and $x_1$ as your path.
not so fast, get well-acquainted with path connectedness first. can you prove that $\Bbb R^2 - \{(0, 0)\}$ is path connected now? (note that your argument doesn't work anymore. why?)
 
Okay geometry... I also thought of the punctured plane though @Balarka
 
@Remember You were talking of punctured planes from the beginning. Why?
What has punctured plane got to do with pathconnectedness of $\Bbb R^2$?
 
No nothing to do ..... Just a wild thought :)
 
try to eject wild thoughts out of your head. they won't help you do sensible mathematics.
 
Okay........
 
11:52 AM
(speaking from experience)
@Remember So, can you show $\Bbb R^2 - \{(0, 0)\}$ is path connected?
First tell me : do you think it is path connected?
 
Okay @Balarka but now we dont have the point (0) now so..
What about $f(0)$....
 
$f(0) = x_0$, so everything is fine. you're on the right track. what goes wrong with your previously defined function?
 
Yes it is .... I got it thorough a diagram
Okay okay...
 
Note that you define a path for a given pair of points $x_0, x_1$ in your space $X$. $X$ is path connected if a path can be defined for any pair of points. Just making a note, since you seem to always confuse quantifiers (without which much mathematics cannot be done)
 
Lets see if we dont have a point in $\Bbb{R^2}$ then we can still form a continuous path because since we are on the plane I could just draw a path around it which will still be continuous
 
11:56 AM
Exactly right. That said, what's wrong with $f : t \mapsto x_0 t + (1 - t)x_1$?
Hint : does it stay in $\Bbb R^2 - \{0, 0\}$ for every pair of points $x_0, x_1 \in \Bbb R^2 - \{0, 0\}$?
try to visualize. draw stuff.
 
@Hippalectryon Hi
 
@BalarkaSen The first film was good. Then the quality slowly drops off, I agree. But, considering the crap that goes for film adaptations (I'm looking at you, HP), LOTR ones are nice.
 
@Hippalectryon Show me a brilliant proof in one line to $$\int_0^{\pi/2} \text{Li}_2(\cot (x)) \, dx$$
 

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