6
$\begingroup$

I will try and show that if our group $G$ is not cyclic then it is isomorphic to Klein's four-group $V$.

So suppose $G$ is not cyclic. Then its elements, excluding $e$, are of order $3$ or $2$. Supposing there is an element of order $3$ gives three distinct elements $g, g^2, g^3$. By hypothesis there exists $h \in G$ such that $h$ is distinct from these three elements. So we can make $gh$ which must be equal to one of the elements previously mentioned. Setting this equal to the various elements:

\begin{align} &gh=g \Rightarrow h=e && gh=g^2 \Rightarrow h=g & \\ &gh=h \Rightarrow g=e, && gh=g^3 \Rightarrow h=g^2 & \end{align} Each of which is a contradiction. Therefore all the elements are of order two and we can get an isomorphism between $G$ and $H \times H$ where $ H$ is cyclic of order two. But this direct product is isomorphic to Klein's four-group so $G$ is isomorphic to $V$.

Is this correct?

Also it is just given in the book that $V$ is isomorphic to this product; how do I show this without checking that $f(gh)=f(g)f(h)$ for all combinations?

  • 0
    There cannot be **an** element of order $3$ ($x\neq e$).2012-07-01

2 Answers 2

3

An idea: let $\,G=\{1,a,b,c\}\,$ be a non cyclic group of order $\,4\,$, so we can assume $\,a,b\,$ are not powers of each other.

The question is: what is $\,ab\,$?? You should find pretty easy to show this must be $\,c\,$ and, with a few lines more, you prove both that $\,G\,$ is abelian and in fact the same (i.e., isomorphic to) the Viergruppe $\,V\,$.

Another idea: you seem to feel pretty comfortable using isomorphisms, Klein group and stuff: why won't you use directly Lagrange's Theorem and avoid all that long proof about the impossibility of an element of order 3?

  • 0
    Of course....yikes! Thank you @ArturoMagidin . Corrected2012-07-01
0

I was going to ask if my proof of this is correct, so here it is, please tell me if it is fine.

Proof. Let G be a group of order 4 by the Lagrange theorem any element of G has order 1,2 or 4. If G has an element of order 4 then it generates so G is cyclic. Assume G has not elements of order 4, then G has 3 elements of order 2. Since the order of G is $2^2$ then G is Abelian (by the class equation). So G is Abelian and has 3 elements of order 2 and 1 of order 1 (the identity), it follows that G is isomorphic to the klein four group.