What is the significance/geometric interpretation of eigen values or eigen vectors in a vector space?
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We like to reduce transformations to combinations of simpler ones. A very simple kind of transformation is a dilation. We can often reduce a linear transformation to dilations to different extents along different directions. This is called diagonalization (strictly speaking, diagonalization over the real numbers). With a bit more work, we can also make eigenvalues tell us about rotation. What they cannot really tell us about is shear. – Ian Nov 04 '15 at 05:05
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There is definitely an old question about this somewhere on the site with plenty of good answers. – Ben Grossmann Nov 04 '15 at 05:20
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here it is – Ben Grossmann Nov 04 '15 at 05:22
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1actually I was thinking of this one – Ben Grossmann Nov 04 '15 at 05:24