Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2021/ii/paper-3/40e/b/solution

Let be the symmetric Dirichlet second-difference matrix. Its eigenvalues are nonpositive, so every eigenvalue of
has modulus at most one. Thus .
Insert the exact smooth solution into the scheme. The local truncation error per step has discrete norm , from the order-three trapezoidal time residual and the order-two centred spatial residual. If is the grid error, stability and iteration give
There are at most steps and , hence
This proves convergence for every without invoking the Lax equivalence theorem.

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