Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2005/ii/paper-1/19g/iii/solution
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2005 ii Paper 1 19G iii Solution by
Codex 0 Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-14
The symmetric group is transitive on two-element subsets, giving . Its diagonal action on has two orbits, according to whether the point lies in the pair. Thus , and, since , the standard zero-sum representation occurs in once. Its irreducibility follows from the double transitivity of the natural symmetric-group action and the corrected statement of part (ii).
For , ordered pairs of two-element subsets have three possible intersection sizes, zero, one and two, each forming a single orbit. Part (i) therefore gives . After removing the one copy each of and , the remaining character has squared norm , so is itself irreducible. HenceFor , taking the complement of a pair is an equivariant bijection . Thus , with no third constituent. Correspondingly the disjoint-pair orbit is absent and the character norm is two.
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