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Research notes on every problem, and a library of the papers behind them. Built from the open erdos repository.

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Erdős assigns signs to edges e(i,j)e(i,j) on printed p.30 / PDF p.2 of the archive's scan (https://users.renyi.hu/~p_erdos/1963-15.pdf). The sum on a vertex subset counts each unordered edge once. On printed p.31 / PDF p.3, he defines H(n)H(n) as the minimum over edge colorings of the largest absolute sum on an induced complete subgraph. Theorem II then displays

n4≤H(n)<C4n3/2.\frac n4\le H(n)<C_4n^{3/2}.

This is the normalized quantity in the convention record. The displayed theorem does not state a small-nn threshold. It cannot literally cover n=1n=1, where there are no edges and H(1)=0H(1)=0. We retain it as the historical linear lower and order-n3/2n^{3/2} upper bound without inferring all-nn endpoints from the omitted range. The later Erdős--Spencer theorem states its sufficiently-large-nn range explicitly.

The constant C4C_4 is not given a value; the paper's convention on p.29 makes c1,c2,…c_1,c_2,\ldots positive constants, and its proof takes C4C_4 to be a sufficiently large absolute constant. The English summary on printed p.37 restates the theorem as n/4<H(n)<cn3/2n/4<H(n)<cn^{3/2}, with a strict lower inequality. The paper suggests (p.31) that the upper bound is probably very poor and that the lower bound may not be far from the true order, though 14\frac14 can surely be replaced by a larger value.

Proof pointer. Lower bound, printed p.35: after exchanging the two classes if needed, a vertex has at least [(n−1)/2][(n-1)/2] edges in the first class; either those neighbours span a sum at most −n/4-n/4, or adding the vertex gives a sum the paper concludes is at least n/4n/4. As printed, the second case adds [(n−1)/2][(n-1)/2] to a sum exceeding −n/4-n/4, which gives more than n/4−1n/4-1; this page does not reconstruct how the stated n/4n/4 follows for every nn. Upper bound, printed p.36, not given in detail: as in (17)--(18) for Theorem I, for each fixed complete subgraph fewer than 2(n2)−n2^{\binom n2-n} signings give it a sum of absolute value at least C4n3/2C_4n^{3/2}, and a union bound over the 2n2^n vertex subsets leaves a signing with every such sum at most C4n3/2C_4n^{3/2}.

Proof scope. The definition, the statement and the proof on pp.35--36 were read on the printed pages. The tail count behind the upper bound is the one the paper leaves to the reader for (18), and was not re-derived; no arbitrary ordered-pair assertion is made here.

Source. P. Erdős, Ramsey és Van der Waerden tételével kapcsolatos kombinatorikai kérdésekről, Mat. Lapok 14 (1963), 29--37, Theorem II, printed p.31 / PDF p.3; proof pp.35--36.

Bears on. Problem 1028: the theorem bounds the problem's edge quantity, read with one sign per unordered edge, by n/4≤H(n)<C4n3/2n/4\le H(n)<C_4n^{3/2} as printed; its upper bound has the order n3/2n^{3/2} that the later Erdős--Spencer theorem shows is the true order for sufficiently large nn, and its linear lower bound is not of that order.