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Cantor's Power Set Theorem says that if
is any set, then there is an injection from
to
but no bijection, so
.
In particular it follows that
is uncountable.
The first part of the theorem is easy:
- For any set
, the map
, defined for any
gives a well-defined injection from
.
The second part goes as follows.
- Let
be a map.
Put
.
Then
is a well-defined subset of
.
We prove that no
exists, such that
, for some
.
Suppose the contrary so there is
with
.
We ask: is
?
- If
, then
is false, so by definition of
we have
, a contradiction.
- If
, then
is true, so by definition of
we have
, a contradiction.
So both the conditions
and
lead to a contradiction.
So the assumption that
for
leads to a contradiction.
So no such
exists.
So the set
is not in the range of
.
So
is not surjective.
We have proved that for any set
, there is no surjection from
, so no bijection either and we are done.
Next: A surjection: ; the
Up: Finiteness09february2012
Previous: Countable sets
George A. J. Sparling
2012-02-09