Consider the smooth map
Its derivative is
At write . Then
This derivative is onto the ten-dimensional space of symmetric matrices: for a symmetric , taking gives . Hence is a regular value. Since has dimension 16, the regular level set theorem gives
The tangent vectors are exactly those for which the derivative vanishes:
Writing in one-plus-three block form shows explicitly that
The three entries of and three independent entries of the skew-symmetric matrix again display dimension six. This is the Lie algebra of the Lorentz group.