Homology, Hilbert functions, and the conservation of number

1. Introduction. The principle of the Conservation of Number is concerned with the following situation. One starts with a system of algebraic equations having only a finite number of solutions and then applies a homomorphism whose domain contains the coefficients of those equations. This produces a new system. Let us suppose that the new system of equations also has only a finite number of solutions. The question then arises as to how the number of solutions before specialization compares with the number present afterwards. In a typical geometrical situation, one usually wishes to assert that the two systems have equally many solutions. However, it is easy to construct algebraic situations where the number changes,† and where the change is not to be explained away through the confluence of solutions or by their slipping off to infinity. At first sight this represents a breakdown of the conservation principle, but this principle has proved so useful in the past that one has a natural reluctance to discard it. The alternative is to attempt a reformulation and in (l) the present author gave such a reformulation for the case in which the specialization consisted in mapping a regular local ring on to its residue field. The modified theory requires that we take account of systems of equations which arise in connexion with the homology modules of a certain complex. The system associated with the homology module of degree zero is found to be the same as the one that arises in the naive theory, and usually this is the only one that makes a contribution. However, in cases where the number of solutions appears to change, the other systems become active and act in such a way that the balance is restored. For an amplification of these remarks we must refer the reader to (l). They are made here to indicate how the relevance of homological concepts first became clear in any detail. In the present paper these ideas are taken further, the principal gain being that it is no longer necessary to restrict the type of specialization to that which consists in mapping a regular local ring on to its residue field. Indeed one can use very general specializations provided that one transfers the homological requirement from the ring to the system of equations under consideration. In this way, one obtains a theory which is more general and, in some of its aspects, simpler as well.