This is my first input into this forum, so sorry for the bad font etc...
The basic proof that you want is in this article:
http://www.maths.lancs.ac.uk/~jameson/ellagm.pdf
after one recognizes that the arithmetic averages of Adlaj's MAGM (a_n)
are just the same as the one minus the partial sums of jameson's (Gauss's) series.
The first iterations being equal is easy to show, one just can see it
in arithmetic... but how to prove this is true for any n?
Well, I took the MAGM formulae, and using d_2,d_3,d_4,d_5 (*)
as d_n,d_(n+1),d(n+2),d(n+3) I get the following:
AGM MAGM
a b d1 e1 f1
a2 b2 d2 e2 f2
a3 b3 d3 e3 f3
a4 b4 d4 e4 f4
a5 b5 d5 e5 f5
the following apply to MAGM (I use REDUCE to help myself through these), del^2 and dsq being two ways to calculate (f3-f2)^2...
del:=(D3-D2)^2/4/(D4-D3)+D4-(D4-D3)^2/4/(D5-D4)-D5;
dsq:=(E2-F2)*(D2-F2);
f2:=(D3-D2)^2/4/(D4-D3)+D4;
e2:=2*d3-D2;
bigd:=dsq-del^2;
bign:=bigd*(d5-d4)^2*(d4-d3)^2;
for the MAGM to be obeyed we need dsq=del^2 or equivalently bign=0
now, from the Jamieson article
d1=1-c0^2/2
d2=d1-c1^2
d3=d2-c2^2*2
etc...
which I write as:
d3:=d2-s3;
d4:=d3-s4;
d5:=d4-s5;
reduce shows me that bign is quite a bit simpler now:
bign/s4;
on factor;
bign/s4;
now finally, from the AGM...:
s3:=(a^2-b^2)/2;
s4:=(a/2-b/2)^2;
s5:=(2*sqrt(a*b)-a-b)^2/8;
there after, I ask REDUCE to calculate...
bign/s4;
and it returns zero, QED...
To make a nice formatted version of this proof, I would copy and paste the
output from REDUCE... but I guess anybody can do that for themselves. The
REDUCE script you need is all the lines ending with a semicolumn above..
So let me know if you want clarifications or if you are interested that I
develop this into a well-written mini-article. I would rather let someone
else do that as my day job is not mathematician...! but eventually I could
do it myself too...
Francois
(*) I used d_n instead of a_n from Adlaj's article because I wanted to use Jameson's a_n for the plain AGM...
Post-scriptum, December 2019:
It is easy to see the first iterations of Jamieson/Gauss match that of Semjon Adlaj. Now, as far as generalizing this to all the iterations, I have built an easier "proof by contradiction". Here it is:
Suppose there is a breaking point of the series of equalities, i.e. a number B where R_B β A_B, while R_{B-1} = A_{B-1}.
One remarkable property of the MAGM series is that one can add a constant K to all the A, S, and D
numbers, and it will still be a MAGM, as "K" comes out added on each row via D (for S and D) and via the average (for A), the differences not changing. This means that we can build a MAGM where we add b to each and all the numbers.
Apart from a needed scale factor, the second row (the N=1 row) now looks exactly like a first row (with a different value of b), because the D value is zero, which is the characteristic of the first row of a MAGM.
The different value of b is b*=(2b/(1/2+b^2/2+b)^(1/2)=2b^(1/2)/(1+b)
Another remarkable property of the MAGM is that we can apply any scale factor to a MAGM sequence, and still get a MAGM, because when calculating a new row, if all the values are a factor π_MAGM times as large as before, all the values of the new row will simply be a factor π_MAGM times as large as before.
The scale factor that we need to make the A of the second row a "1", like the A of the first row was, is easy to figure out:
S_MAGM = 1/(1/2+b^2/2+b) = 2/(1+b)^2
After these two operations, the second row has become a first row (for πβ instead of π, but it holds for any value of either in the range ]0,1]).
The increments in the R column are scaled by the square of that factor. If we rescale by
π_AGM=1/((1+b)/2), the second row of the AGM looks like a first row, with the "new b value" πβ being 2βπ/(1 + π), as in the MAGM above, and the running sum increments will be scaled by the square of
π_AGM, 1/((1+b)/2)/((1+b)/2)= 4/(1+b)^2. This is twice the scaling of MAGM. In order to use the second row of the R column as a first row, we need to make one further change: divide all the numbers by 2, because 2^{P-2} is half of 2^{N-2} when P=N-1 is the row number counting from the second row, which differs
by one from the row number N counting from the first row.
After setting the new first row R value π
_1 to 1, we can now see that we are getting a set of values R matching (at least initially) the MAGM's set of values A, since we have set the first values the same, and
the increments are the same due to identical scaling factors.
The breaking point of the equality being at B means that as far as the newly built table is concerned, the breaking point of the equality will be at B-1. The breaking point of the equality cannot depend on the
value of b, and yet the breaking point of the equality is B when considering b, and B-1, when considering b*. We arrive at the impossible conclusion that B=B-1.
The conclusion being impossible, the hypothesis of a finite B where equality of the R and A series breaks is itself impossible, so π΄_n = π
_n for any n, and thus the limit is the same, and MAGM(1,b)=1-S, where S is
the scaled sum of the differences between the square of the arithmetic and geometric means of the plain AGM. QED.