R. Frisch, in a paper (Frisch, 1928) on correlation and scatter in statistical variables, made an extensive use of matrices, and in particular of the moment matrix, as he called it, of a set of variables. The matrices were square arrays, with an equal number of rows and columns. This paper of Frisch pointed the way to an even more extensive use of the algebra of matrices in problems of statistics.

What Frisch called the moment matrix may perhaps be more suitably called, nowadays, the variance matrix of a set or vector of variates, since the moments in question are all variances or covariances. In the present paper, which is illustrative of matrix methods, we explore the familiar ground of linear approximation by Least Squares, making full use of the properties of the variance matrix. We also study the linear transformations that convert crude data into smoothed or graduated values, or into residuals, or into coefficients in a linear representation by chosen functions.

In this paper two computational processes are outlined in which the table of Chebyshev Polynomials Cn(x) = 2 cos (n cos−1 ½x) given in the preceding paper may be used with effect; these processes are (a) interpolation and (b) Fourier synthesis. A brief outline is also given of the idea behind the process of “Economization of Power Series” developed in Lanczos, 1938; this is related to (a). Finally the application of (b) to the calculation of Mathieu functions is considered.

If is a fixed point of a Riemannian Vn of fundamental tensor gij, and if s is the geodesic distance between it and a variable point (xi), then the Vn has been called centrally harmonic with respect to the base-point if

is a function of s only, and completely harmonic if this holds for every choice of base-point . A flat Vn (gij=δij) is obviously completely harmonic, since for such a space and

1. Introduction.—The object of this paper is twofold: firstly, to present a table of the Chebyshev polynomials Cn(x) = 2 cos (n cos−1 ½x) for n = I(I)12 and x = o(o·o2)2, values being exact or to 10 decimals; secondly, to provide a working list of coefficients and formulæ relating to these and allied functions.

Valuable accounts of applications and properties will be found in Van der Pol and Weijers, 1933, in Lanczos, 1938, and in Szego, 1939. Further applications are indicated in the following paper, by J. C. P. Miller, which also suggests methods of reducing the inconvenience caused by the present lack of tables of the allied polynomials Sn(x). It is hoped that suitable tables will be prepared later.

This paper has for object the calculation of a ladder network, using trigonometrical functions of real multiples of (– I)¼ which, in many cases, simplify practical formulae. The work was prepared particularly for application to transmission lines, conductors in electrical machines, and isolated cylindrical conductors. The effect of the conjunction of two or more dissimilar networks is considered, leading to a method of assessing the impedance of a conductor of any shape embedded in an open slot cut in highly permeable material.

1. It was remarked by me a few years ago that temporal regraduations, other than trivial changes of zero and unit, had not so far been considered in General Relativity. An interesting paper by Dr G. C. McVittie has now appeared in which regraduations are examined in certain spherically symmetric space-times. Under the assumptions made by McVittie it is shown that regraduations can exist for some but not all space-times, those for which they can exist being of a very special form which excludes many space-times generally regarded as significant or interesting. In the present paper I take the matter further and discuss the problem with more generality. It will be shown that the existence of non-trivial regraduations depends firstly upon which theory is being assumed for the derivation of the conservation equations There are two alternatives, and regraduations are found to be excluded by one, the “geodesic” theory, but not necessarily by the other, the “equivalence” theory.

1. Introduction.—One of the most important of Milne's discoveries is undoubtedly the significance of time-scale regraduations and, in particular, the relation between atomic t-time and gravitational τ-time. Although in Milne's work t-time is more fundamental than τ-time, this relationship is not inevitable, as was shown in an axiomatic development of cosmology given recently by the author. There the τ-scale was the more fundamental, and it was not found necessary to introduce Milne's t-scale. The object of the present paper is to discuss this primitive τ-scale still further, and to show how the t-scale may be introduced by means of an axiom. The unpublished work mentioned above is not required for this purpose because the cosmological models considered here were described in earlier papers (Walker, 1937, 1940 b). We also examine the various constants, absolute and conventional, which are connected with the different scales of time and length, and with different models.

Substitutional equations of the type considered by the late Alfred Young are shown to be intimately related with the theory of idempotents. Any equation LX = o possessing solutions other than X = o is shown to have the same solutions as another equation MX = o, where M is obtained from L by premultiplying the latter by a suitably chosen expression A and where the minimum equation of M is xψ(x) = o, ψ(x) being prime to x. The expression ψ(M) is then idempotent, and it is shown that the most general solution of LX = o is X = ψ(M)Y, where Y is an arbitrary expression. The number of linearly independent solutions of LX = o is X = ψ(M)Y, where Y is an arbitrary expression. The number of linearly independent solutions of LX = o is kn!, where k is the coefficient of the unit permutation in ψ(M) when that expression is expressed in terms of the permutations of the symmetric group Sn.

Corresponding results are obtained for the equation LX = R, and methods are given for solving sets of simultaneous equations of both types.

Studying the interaction of different pure fields, we have been led to some essential modifications of the ideas on which our quantum mechanics of fields is based. We shall explain these here for the example of the interaction of the Maxwell and the Dirac field.

In Part I we showed that a pure field in a given volume Ω can be described by considering the potentials and field components as matrices, not attached to single points in Ω (as the theory of Heisenberg and Pauli), but to the whole volume. Further, we assumed the total energy and momentum to be the product of Ω and the corresponding densities. In Part † we showed that this conception has to be modified; the eigenvalues of the energy and momentum as defined in Part I represent neither the states of single particles nor of a system of particles, but of something intermediate which corresponds to the simple oscillators of Heisenberg-Pauli and which we have called apeirons. The total energy and momentum of the system is a sum over the contributions of an assembly of apeirons. Mathematically the differences of the quantum mechanics of a field from that of a set of mass points (as treated in ordinary quantum mechanics) is the fact that the matrices representing a field are reducible (while those representing co-ordinates of mass points are irreducible); each irreducible submatrix corresponds to an apeiron.

The changes in his description of events brought about by an arbitrary regraduation of an observer's clock are examined, taking the axioms of general relativity as fundamental. It is shown that regraduation does not imply a change from one Riemannian space-time to another but merely a coordinate transformation within space-time. A generalisation of the “dynamical time” of kinematical relativity is a by-product of the investigation.

1. 1. An n : l is defined as a group of n particles which can be contained within a seeker length l moving around a closed line of length L on which N particles are distributed at random. An expression has been obtained for the average number of distinct n : l's per closed line.

2. 2. An expression has also been derived for the average numbers of n : l's in the corresponding problem where the line of length L containing the N particles is open and not closed.

3. 3. Analogous problems in two dimensions are considered, in which the particles are arranged at random on a plane and the place of the seeker line is taken by an orientated rectangle. Exact expressions are given for the desired averages.

4. 4. The extension of the methods used to analogous problems in three dimensions is discussed. Exact expressions have not been obtained, but approximations are given which hold when n is much greater or much smaller than x, the average number found within the seeker area.

6. The expected score of an individual on a test consisting of a large number of items is assumed to be given by a formula involving the ability of the individual and also two quantities constant for the test. An expression is then derived for the covariance between two tests measuring different abilities. It appears that if a factorial analysis is performed on a set of tests of unequal difficulty, using the matrix of variances and covariances, a spurious factor will tend to be introduced depending mainly on the differences in difficulty. The effect of this is removed by transforming the variances and covariances to a new set of coefficients. A numerical example of the process is given.

In conclusion I should like to thank the Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland for a grant to cover the cost of the setting and printing of mathematical formulæ in a paper previously published in the Society's Proceedings (LXI, A, 1943, 273–287).

In the Proc. Roy. Soc. Edin. (Houstoun, 1941) I described a new method of measuring the velocity of light. Owing to the difficulties of the times progress has been slow, but I have now succeeded in measuring the velocity of light in water and communicate the result here.

Previous Measurements.—Every elementary textbook on Light explains how Newton's, corpuscular theory required the velocity of light in water to be μ times the velocity in air, whereas Huygens's wave theory required it to be I/μ times the velocity in air, and how Foucault's determination decided between the two theories. As a matter of fact it did, but Foucault's determination was not an accurate one and there have been only four previous determinations of the velocity of light in water, none of which can lay claim to accuracy. These are the determinations of Foucault (1850), Fizeau and Bréguet (1850), A. A. Michelson (1891), and Gutton (1911).

Wave functions have been obtained for the ground states of the atoms Li to Ne. These are of the simple analytical type proposed by Morse, Young, and Haurwitz. Some errors in the latter work are corrected.

In 1902, Professor E. T. Whittaker gave a general solution of Laplace's equation in the form

where f is an arbitrary function of the two variables. It appears that this is not the most general solution, since there are harmonic functions, such as r−1Q0(cos θ), which cannot be expressed in this form near the origin. The difficulty is naturally connected with the location of the singular points of the harmonic function. It seems therefore to be worth while considering afresh the conditions under which Whittaker's solution is valid.

In this paper the curvature tensor Rijkl in a Riemannian Vn is used to define a quadratic complex of lines in an (n – I)-dimensional projective space Sn–1. Work in this direction has been done for a V4 by Struik (1927–28), Lamson (1930), and Churchill (1932). Of these, Struik and Lamson both use 3-dimensional projective geometry, the former for the purpose of defining sets of “principal directions” in V4 by means of the Riemann tensor, and the latter for the purpose of discussing some of the differential and algebraic consequences of the field equations of general relativity. Churchill considers the geometry of the Riemann tensor from the point of view of 4-dimensional Euclidean geometry. In this paper an indication is given of the nature of the general n-dimensional theory, which, by way of elementary illustration, is then applied in moderate detail to a V3. A few general formulae are also obtained for a V4.

There is a mode of specialising a quartic polynomial which causes a binary quartic to become equianharmonic and a ternary quartic to become a Klein quartic, admitting a group of 168 linear self-transformations. The six relations which must be satisfied by the coefficients of the ternary quartic were given by Coble forty years ago, but their true significance was never suspected and they have remained until now an isolated curiosity. In § 2 we give, in terms of a quadric and a Veronese surface, the geometrical interpretation of the six relations; we also give, in terms of the adjugate of a certain matrix, their algebraical interpretation. Both these interpretations make it abundantly clear that this set of relations specialising a ternary quartic has analogues for quartic polynomials in any number of variables, and point unmistakably to what these analogues are.

That a ternary quartic is, when so specialised, a Klein quartic is proved in §§ 4–6. The proof bifurcates after (5.3); one branch leads instantly to the standard form of the Klein quartic while the other leads to another form which, on applying a known test, is found also to represent a Klein quartic. One or two properties of the curve follow from this new form of its equation. In §§ 8–10 some properties of a Veronese surface are established which are related to known properties of plane quartic curves; and these considerations lead to a discussion, in § 11, of certain hexads of points associated with a Klein curve.