Analysis reveals that α=1/e is the unique value making series converge with Euler constants, suggesting broader implications.
From a well-known equation of Hardy, one can derive a simple linear combination of the Euler-Mascheroni constant (γ=0.577215…) and Euler-Gompertz constant (δ=0.596347…): γ+δ/e=Ein(1). Although neither $γ$ nor $δ$ is currently known to be irrational, this linear combination has been shown to be transcendental (by virtue of the fact that it appears as an algebraic point value of a particular E-function). Moreover, both pairs ($γ$,$δ$) and ($γ$,$δ/e$) are known to be disjunctively transcendental. In light of these observations, we investigate the impact of the coefficient $α$ in combinations of the form $γ+αδ$, and find that $α=1/e$ is the unique coefficient value such that canonical Borel-summable divergent series for $γ$ and $δ$ can be linearly combined to force conventional convergence of the resulting series. We further indicate how this uniqueness property extends to a sequence of generalized linear combinations, γ⁽ⁿ⁾+αδ⁽ⁿ⁾, with γ⁽ⁿ⁾ and δ⁽ⁿ⁾ given by (ordinary and conditional) moments of the Gumbel(0,1) probability distribution.
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Michael R. Powers (2025) studied this question.
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