Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2021 ib Paper 2 8E b iii Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-09-25
If , the operator is invertible on . Indeed, there it equalswhose inverse is the finite geometric series
Now use induction on . If , apply . The term vanishes, while every transformed vectoris nonzero by the invertibility just proved and still lies in . The induction hypothesis rules out the resulting relation. Allowing scalar coefficients, and omitting zero terms, gives the same argument. Hence the generalized eigenspaces for distinct eigenvalues form a direct sum, so are linearly independent.