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2. On the Roots of ε2 = −1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 September 2014

Gustav Plarr
Affiliation:
Docteur ès-Sciences Math
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Extract

The imaginaries of Algebra have done good service during the process of discovery of the principles of quaternions. Now that those principles have been founded on the basis of operations on real lines, we must no more admit as the equivalent of a unit-vector. Vectors, and unit-vectors, by their very definition, represent real lines, each of given direction and length, and a real quantity cannot be represented by an imaginary one.

Type
Proceedings 1887-88
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Society of Edinburgh 1889

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