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Questions about the branch of algebra that deals with groups.

13 votes
Accepted

Two finite groups with the same identical relations?

Z/2 and Z/2 x Z/2 have the same identical relations: those words w such that every variable in w appears an even number of times. (This is obviously sufficient for w to be an identical relation. If …
Reid Barton's user avatar
  • 25.2k
9 votes
1 answer
719 views

Presentation for the double cover of A_n

The wikipedia page Covering groups of the alternating and symmetric groups gives explicit presentations for the double covers of the symmetric group Sn (n ≥ 4). Can someone provide a similar presenta …
Reid Barton's user avatar
  • 25.2k
1 vote
Accepted

Shear transformations

It might be helpful to note that, in two dimensions, a shear transformation is exactly one whose Jordan canonical form is $\begin{pmatrix}1&1\\0&1\end{pmatrix}$ or $\begin{pmatrix}1&0\\0&1\end{pmatri …
Reid Barton's user avatar
  • 25.2k
13 votes

What are the auto-equivalences of the category of groups?

Just to make this a little more visible: for a proof that every autoequivalence of the category of groups is naturally isomorphic to the identity, see page 31 of Peter Freyd's book "Abelian Categories …
11 votes

What are the auto-equivalences of the category of groups?

Your functor –op is naturally isomorphic to the identity, via the natural transformation G → Gop sending g to g-1. (If you asked about monoids, not groups, then –op would be a nontrivial autoequivale …
Reid Barton's user avatar
  • 25.2k
49 votes
1 answer
8k views

Order of an automorphism of a finite group

Let G be a finite group of order n. Must every automorphism of G have order less than n? (David Speyer: I got this question from you long ago, but I don't know whether you knew the answer. I stil d …
Reid Barton's user avatar
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17 votes
Accepted

Countable subgroups of compact groups

Your questions are related to Bohr compactification, a left adjoint to the inclusion of compact (= compact Hausdorff) groups into all topological groups. A discrete group G can be embedded into a com …
Reid Barton's user avatar
  • 25.2k
7 votes

Cogroup objects

Eric already explained exactly how the suspension of a space and in particular S1 is a cogroup object in the homotopy category of pointed spaces. I'll just point out that we know it must be one, by Y …
Reid Barton's user avatar
  • 25.2k
11 votes

Find a "natural" group that contains the quotient of the infinite symmetric group by the alt...

If one considers the distinguishing feature of the sign homomorphism $S_n \to \mathbb{Z}/2$ to be that it is the canonical map from $S_n$ to its abelianization, then there is nothing analogous for $S_ …
Reid Barton's user avatar
  • 25.2k
23 votes

Why do Groups and Abelian Groups feel so different?

I think there is something to this idea that abelian groups are only groups "by accident". Here is at least a construction of the category of commutative monoids which does not mention the monoidal o …
Reid Barton's user avatar
  • 25.2k
33 votes
Accepted

Is there a "universal group object"? (answered: yes!)

Yes, the category U is the opposite of the full subcategory of Grp on the free groups on 0, 1, 2, ... generators. This is an instance of Lawvere's theory of "theories". See this nLab entry for a dis …
Reid Barton's user avatar
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28 votes
Accepted

Computing the structure of the group completion of an abelian monoid, how hard can it be?

Do people have good examples where it's "easy" to compute the group-completion of a commutative monoid, but for which the monoid itself is still rather mysterious? This happens all the time in K- …
Reid Barton's user avatar
  • 25.2k