Sec. 2.

3 Some Preliminary Lemmas 33

Doe s the mu ltip li cation in G remind you of anything? Write ( a b )

a s a/ + bjwhere J = ( 0
-I
l
0
) -b
and co mpute the produ ct in the se ter ms.
a

Perhap s that wi ll ring a be ll with you.

# Example 2.2.9 Let G be the set of a ll 2 x 2 matri ce s (: �) where

a, b, c, dare integer s modu lo p, p a pri me num ber, su ch that ad - be #- 0.

De fine the mu ltip il cation in G a s we did in E xamp le 2 . 2.6, under standing
the mu ltip li cation and addition of the entrie s to be tho se modu lo p. We
leave it to the reader to verify that Gi s a non -a be lian finitegroup .

In fa ct , how many e el ment sdoe s Ghave? Perhap s it might be in stru ctive

for the reader to try the ear ly ca se s p = 2 and p = 3. Here one can write
down a ll the e lement s of G e xp li cit y
l . (A word of warning ! For p = 3,
Ga rl eady ha s 48e el ment s.) To get the ca se of a genera lprime, pwi llrequire
an idea rather than a dire ct ha cking -out of the an swer. Try it !

2.3 Some Prel iminary lemmas

We have now been e xpo sed to the theory of group sfor severa l page sand a s
yet not a sing le , so litary fa ct ha s been proved a bout group s. It i s high time
to remedy thi s situation. A lthough the fir st few re su tl s we demon strate are,
admitted ly , not very e xciting (in fa ct , they are rather du ll) they wi ll be
e xtreme y l u sefu L Learning the a p l ha bet wa spro ba bly not the mo st intere st ing
part of our chi ldhood edu cation ,yet ,on ce thi shurd le wa s cleared ,fa scinating
vi sta s were opened before u s.
We begin with

LE M MA 2.3.1 If G is a group, then

a. The identity element of G is unique.

b. Every a E G has a unique inverse in G.
c. For every a e G, (a - 1) - 1 a.
d. For all a, b e G, (a · b) 1 = r 1 · a 1 •

Proof. Before we pro ceed with the proof it se lf it might be advi sa ble to
see what it i s that we are going to prove. In part (a) we want to show that if
two e el ment s e and fin G en joy the property that for every a E G, a =
a e = e a = a · f = f · a, then e = f In part ( b) our aim i s to show that
• ·

if x · a = a · x = e and y · a = a ·y = e, where a ll of a, x,y are in G, then

X = y.