Synthetic geometry of the real projective plane Updated 2025-07-16
It good to think about how Euclid's postulates look like in the real projective plane:
- Since there is one point of infinity for each direction, there is one such point for every direction the two parallel lines might be at. The parallel postulate does not hold, and is replaced with a simpler more elegant version: every two lines meet at exactly one point.One thing to note however is that ther real projective plane does not have angles defined on it by definition. Those can be defined, forming elliptic geometry through the projective model of elliptic geometry, but we can interpret the "parallel lines" as "two lines that meet at a point at infinity"
- points in the real projective plane are lines in
- lines in the real projective plane are planes in .For every two projective points there is a single projective line that passes through them.Note however that not all lines in the real plane correspond to a projective line: only lines tangent to a circle at zero do.
Unlike the real projective line which is homotopic to the circle, the real projective plane is not homotopic to the sphere.
The topological difference bewteen the sphere and the real projective space is that for the sphere all those points in the x-y circle are identified to a single point.
One more generalized argument of this is the classification of closed surfaces, in which the real projective plane is a sphere with a hole cut and one Möbius strip glued in.
Model of the real projective plane Updated 2025-07-16
The real projective plane is not simply connected Updated 2025-07-16
To see that the real projective plane is not simply connected space, considering the lines through origin model of the real projective plane, take a loop that starts at and moves along the great circle ends at .
Now try to shrink it to a point.
There's just no way!
Point at infinity Updated 2025-07-16
Homogenous coordinates Updated 2025-07-16
Visualizing 4D Updated 2025-07-16
Activation energy Updated 2025-07-16
Catalysis Updated 2025-07-16
Vehicular Combat video game Updated 2025-07-16
Subquotient Updated 2025-07-16
As an overkill example, the happy family are subquotients of the monster group, but the monster group is simple.
Relationship between the quotient group and direct products Updated 2025-07-16
Although quotients look a bit real number division, there are some important differences with the "group analog of multiplication" of direct product of groups.
If a group is isomorphic to the direct product of groups, we can take a quotient of the product to retrieve one of the groups, which is somewhat analogous to division: math.stackexchange.com/questions/723707/how-is-the-quotient-group-related-to-the-direct-product-group
The "converse" is not always true however: a group does not need to be isomorphic to the product of one of its normal subgroups and the associated quotient group. The wiki page provides an example:
Given G and a normal subgroup N, then G is a group extension of G/N by N. One could ask whether this extension is trivial or split; in other words, one could ask whether G is a direct product or semidirect product of N and G/N. This is a special case of the extension problem. An example where the extension is not split is as follows: Let , and which is isomorphic to Z2. Then G/N is also isomorphic to Z2. But Z2 has only the trivial automorphism, so the only semi-direct product of N and G/N is the direct product. Since Z4 is different from Z2 × Z2, we conclude that G is not a semi-direct product of N and G/N.
This is also semi mentioned at: math.stackexchange.com/questions/1596500/when-is-a-group-isomorphic-to-the-product-of-normal-subgroup-and-quotient-group
I think this might be equivalent to why the group extension problem is hard. If this relation were true, then taking the direct product would be the only way to make larger groups from normal subgroups/quotients. But it's not.
Normal subgroup Updated 2025-07-16
Ultimate explanation: math.stackexchange.com/questions/776039/intuition-behind-normal-subgroups/3732426#3732426
Only normal subgroups can be used to form quotient groups: their key definition is that they plus their cosets form a group.
One key intuition is that "a normal subgroup is the kernel" of a group homomorphism, and the normal subgroup plus cosets are isomorphic to the image of the isomorphism, which is what the fundamental theorem on homomorphisms says.
Therefore "there aren't that many group homomorphism", and a normal subgroup it is a concrete and natural way to uniquely represent that homomorphism.
The best way to think about the, is to always think first: what is the homomorphism? And then work out everything else from there.
Once more unto the breach Updated 2025-07-16
Fight fire with fire Updated 2025-07-16
Related quotes:
Abel-Ruffini theorem Updated 2025-07-16
Quantum mechanics experiment Updated 2025-07-16
Atoms exist and last for a long time, while in classical electromagnetic theory punctual orbiting electrons should emit radiation quickly and fall into the nucleus: physics.stackexchange.com/questions/20003/why-dont-electrons-crash-into-the-nuclei-they-orbit
In other sections:
Bibliography:
History of quantum mechanics Updated 2025-07-16
The discovery of the photon was one of the major initiators of quantum mechanics.
Light was very well known to be a wave through diffraction experiments. So how could it also be a particle???
This process "started" in 1900 with Planck's law which was based on discrete energy packets being exchanged as exposed at On the Theory of the Energy Distribution Law of the Normal Spectrum by Max Planck (1900).
This ideas was reinforced by Einstein's explanation of the photoelectric effect in 1905 in terms of photon.
In the next big development was the Bohr model in 1913, which supposed non-classical physics new quantization rules for the electron which explained the hydrogen emission spectrum. The quantization rule used made use of the Planck constant, and so served an initial link between the emerging quantized nature of light, and that of the electron.
The final phase started in 1923, when Louis de Broglie proposed that in analogy to photons, electrons might also be waves, a statement made more precise through the de Broglie relations.
This event opened the floodgates, and soon matrix mechanics was published in quantum mechanical re-interpretation of kinematic and mechanical relations by Heisenberg (1925), as the first coherent formulation of quantum mechanics.
It was followed by the Schrödinger equation in 1926, which proposed an equivalent partial differential equation formulation to matrix mechanics, a mathematical formulation that was more familiar to physicists than the matrix ideas of Heisenberg.
Inward Bound by Abraham Pais (1988) summarizes his views of the main developments of the subjectit:
- Planck's on the discovery of the quantum theory (1900);
- Einstein's on the light-quantum (1905);
- Bohr's on the hydrogen atom (1913);
- Bose's on what came to be called quantum statistics (1924);
- Heisenberg's on what came to be known as matrix mechanics (1925);
- and Schroedinger's on wave mechanics (1926).
Bibliography:
History of quantum mechanics bibliography Updated 2025-07-16
Quantum mechanics bibliography Updated 2025-07-16
Mathematical formulation of quantum mechanics Updated 2025-07-16
These are the key mathematical ideas to understand!!
There are actually a few formulations out there. By far the dominant one as of 2020 has been the Schrödinger picture, which contrasts notably with the Heisenberg picture.
Another well known one is the de Broglie-Bohm theory, which is deterministic, but non-local.
There are unlisted articles, also show them or only show them.