Paper 4, Section II, E

Numbers and Sets
Part IA, 2011

Show that, for any set XX, there is no surjection from XX to the power-set of XX.

Show that there exists an injection from R2\mathbb{R}^{2} to R\mathbb{R}.

Let AA be a subset of R2\mathbb{R}^{2}. A section of AA is a subset of R\mathbb{R} of the form

{tR:a+tbA},\{t \in \mathbb{R}: a+t b \in A\},

where aR2a \in \mathbb{R}^{2} and bR2b \in \mathbb{R}^{2} with b0b \neq 0. Prove that there does not exist a set AR2A \subset \mathbb{R}^{2} such that every set SRS \subset \mathbb{R} is a section of AA.

Does there exist a set AR2A \subset \mathbb{R}^{2} such that every countable set SRS \subset \mathbb{R} is a section of A?A ? \quad [There is no requirement that every section of AA should be countable.] Justify your answer.