Past exam of the year 1 of the computer science course of the University of Oxford / 2022 / Digital systems, linear algebra, introduction to formal proof / 4 / g

For $n=2$, takeThey are commuting operators because every matrix commutes with the identity matrix. However $A$ has only the eigenvalue zero, and $\ker A=\mathrm{span}\{(1,0{)}^T\}$ has dimension one. It has no eigenbasis, so it cannot appear in any simultaneous diagonalization. Equivalently, a diagonal matrix similar to this nonzero nilpotent matrix would have to be zero, an impossibility. For any prescribed $n\ge 2$, use $A=E_{12}$ and $B=I_n$; its zero eigenspace has dimension $n-1$. For $n=1$ no such example exists.