Primitive Element

In mathematics, the term primitive element can mean:

  • Primitive root modulo n, in number theory
  • Primitive element (field theory), an element that generates a given field extension
  • Primitive element (finite field), an element that generates the multiplicative group of a finite field
  • in a Hopf algebra, an element X on which the comultiplication Δ has the value Δ(X) = X⊗1 + 1⊗X
  • in a free group, an element of a free generating set

Famous quotes containing the words primitive and/or element:

    “Human beings will be happier—not when they cure cancer or get to Mars or eliminate racial prejudice or flush Lake Erie but when they find ways to inhabit primitive communities again. That’s my utopia.”
    —Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. (b. 1922)

    “The reverence for the Scriptures is an element of civilization, for thus has the history of the world been preserved, and is preserved.”
    —Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)