Series of Logarithms Sum ln(k) – Ramanujan Summation? – Sequences and Series

divergent-serieslogarithmssequences-and-seriesspecial functions

I had this question earlier, so to say as a "standalone" problem, but now it pops up in context of an analysis with the lngamma-function. As well as we can convert the question of sums of like powers $Su_p(n)=1^p+2^p+3^p+\cdots+n^p$ in terms of the Hurwitz-zeta $Su_p(n) = \zeta(p,1)-\zeta(p,n+1)$ (and solve using the Bernoulli-polynomials) I try to express this for sums of logarithms (and powers of logarithms) : $$ Sl_p(n) = \ln(1)^p+\ln(2)^p+\cdots+\ln(n)^p $$
I have seemingly proper coefficients for power series which allow that computations/approximations. The result is always found by the difference of $ Sl_p(n)-Sl_p(1) $ . Here the power series has zero as constant term.


However, to have the analogue to the Hurwitz-zeta I should have the constant term the "value" for the infinite sum $ Sl_p(\infty) $ instead. (This cancels properly if I formulate the sum of (powers of) logarithms always as that difference $ Sl_p(n)-Sl_p(1) $) And also, I'd like that this agreed conceptually more to the notion:
$$ \begin{array} {rll} Sl_p(n)-Sl_p(1) &=& T_p(0)-T_p(n) \\\
& =& (\ln(1)+\ln(2)+\ln(3)+\cdots) \\\
& & – (\ln(n+1)+\ln(n+2)+\ln(n+2)+\cdots) \end{array} $$
as this agrees more with the idea of the Hurwitz-zeta-difference.

But this requires, that $T_p(0)$ represents the (infinite) sum of the $p$'th powers of the logarithms, and the constant in the power series of $T_p(0)$ must contain just such a value. Let's talk about the first powers of the logs $p=1 $ first and denote the assumed sum as $L_1$ : $ L_1 = \lim_{n\to \infty} T_1(0) $


[update 2]
I think, thanks to the hint of J.M., I can answer Q1 myself now; only Q2 remains somehow vague – besides a simple empirical heuristic I did still not get the formally correct approach to the constant term/integral-definition in the Ramanujan summation – but this is now only a side problem here (however it would be nice to get help also for this question).

With the help of the knowledge about the derivatives of the zeta at zero the relevant part of the problem could now satisfyingly be solved, so I put it here in an answer to my own question, see that answer below….

Final remark/conclusion: it is interesting, that the power series for the lngamma pops up here "automatically" – we need no other uniqueness criterion for the argument, that the (Eulerian) gamma-function gives "the correct" interpolation for the factorial problem. It is just the result of the construction of an operator for the "indefinite summation" (which was the comceptual goal from where the problem/question arose initially)

In the following I keep the rest of the original question although the approach to the Ramanujan summation contains an error
[end Update 2]


I tried to give sense to that divergent series by replacing the powers of $x$ in the Mercator series for $ \ln(1+x) $ by appropriate zetas at negative integer arguments. If I understand things correctly then this is similar to the method of Ramanujan summation, where the Bernoulli numbers are just replaced by the according zeta-values (appropriately scaled). With this I got then an approximation of $$L_1 \approx -0.0810614667953 $$
which seems a rather "random" value…
By searching in other online sources I got the suggestion (OEIS), that this is also $$ \int_1^2 \ln(\Gamma(t)) \; dt \approx -0.08106146679532725821967026 $$

With this my power series for $T_1(x)$ begins like

$ \qquad \small \begin{array} {l}
– & 0.0810614667953 \\
– & 0.577215664902x \\
+ & 0.533859200973x^2 \\
+ & 0.325578788221x^3 \\
+ & 0.125274140308x^4 \\
+ & 0.0337256506589x^5 \\
+ & 0.00685935357296x^6 \\
+ & 0.00117260810356x^7 \\
+ & O(x^8)
\end{array}
$
The other coefficients occur also in the power series for $f(x)=\ln(\Gamma(\exp(x)) $

Also, $L_1$ seem to satisfy the following expression:
$$ \exp(L_1) = {\sqrt{(2\pi)} \over e} \approx 0.9221370088957891168791517 $$

The questions are:
$\qquad$ Q1: Is that value $-0.0801\ldots$ a meaningful (or even correct) representation for the infinite sum of logarithms?
$\qquad$ Q2: Did I reproduce the Ramanujan summation correctly here?


[update 1]: J.M. mentions the relation to $ y= – \zeta'(0) \approx 0.918938533205 $ where the representation of the derivative of zeta at 0 equals formally just the sum of logarithms. Now my $L_1$ and the $y$ are related by $L_1 = y – 1$. So I expect some error in my derivation which leads just to that unit difference…

Best Answer

To address your last comment on evaluating infinite sums of powers of logarithms:

Letting

$$(-1)^n \zeta^{(n)}(s)=\sum_{k=1}^\infty \frac{(\log k)^n}{k^s}$$

the question can be recast as the evaluation of the quantity $(-1)^n \zeta^{(n)}(0)$ for various $n\in \mathbb N$.

Apostol and Choudhury had given a bunch of formulae for evaluating $\zeta^{(n)}(s)$; in particular, there is the formula

$$(-1)^n \zeta^{(n)}(0)=\frac{\Im((-\log\,2\pi-i\pi/2)^{n+1})}{\pi(n+1)}+\frac1{\pi}\sum_{j=1}^{n-1} a_j j!\binom{n}{j}\Im((-\log\,2\pi-i\pi/2)^{n-j})$$

where

$$a_j=c_{j+1}+\sum_{\ell=0}^j \frac{(-1)^\ell \gamma_\ell}{\ell!} c_{j-\ell}$$

$$c_k=-\frac{\gamma c_{k-1}}{k}-\frac1{k}\sum_{\ell=1}^{k-1} (-1)^\ell \zeta(\ell+1) c_{k-\ell-1},\qquad c_0=1$$

the $\gamma_n$ are the Stieltjes constants, and $\gamma=\gamma_0$ is the Euler-Mascheroni Constant.

Here are a few explicit evaluations of the formula:

$$\zeta^{\prime\prime}(0)=\frac{\gamma^2}{2}-\frac{\pi^2}{24}-\frac{(\log (2\pi))^2}{2}+\gamma_1$$

$$-\zeta^{\prime\prime\prime}(0)=-\gamma^3-\frac32 \gamma ^2 \log(2\pi)+\frac{\pi^2}{8}\log(2\pi)+\frac{(\log(2\pi))^3}{2}-3\gamma\gamma _1-3\gamma_1\log (2\pi)-\frac32\gamma_2+\zeta(3)$$

As can be surmised, the closed forms become rather unwieldy as $n$ gets large...

An extension of these results to noninteger powers would involve having to appropriately define the differintegral of the zeta function; going the series route would now involve terms containing the incomplete gamma function, but I've no knowledge of any closed forms for the resulting sum.