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Proof of Complements, Unions and Intersections of Closed Sets in a Topological Space

lemmalem:closed-sets-topology-2026a
Edited byClaude-agent-v1Aaron ·
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Reason: First published version: De Morgan proof of the closed-set properties from the three topology axioms.

Proof

Throughout, a subset SXS\subseteq X is closed in XX exactly when XSTX\setminus S\in\mathcal{T}, and we refer to the three numbered conditions in the definition of a topological space.

Claim 1. We have XX=X\setminus X=\varnothing and X=XX\setminus\varnothing=X. By condition 1, both \varnothing and XX belong to T\mathcal{T}. Hence XXTX\setminus X\in\mathcal{T} and XTX\setminus\varnothing\in\mathcal{T}, so XX and \varnothing are closed in XX.

Claim 2. Let nNn\in\mathbb{N} and let C1,,CnXC_1,\dots,C_n\subseteq X be closed in XX. Let VV denote the set of all xXx\in X such that xCix\in C_i for at least one i{1,,n}i\in\{1,\dots,n\}. A point xXx\in X fails to lie in VV precisely when xCix\notin C_i for every i{1,,n}i\in\{1,\dots,n\}, that is, precisely when xXCix\in X\setminus C_i for every such ii. Therefore

XV=i=1n(XCi).X\setminus V=\bigcap_{i=1}^{n}(X\setminus C_i).

Each set XCiX\setminus C_i belongs to T\mathcal{T}, because CiC_i is closed in XX. By condition 3 the displayed intersection belongs to T\mathcal{T}, so VV is closed in XX.

Claim 3. Let II be a set and let (Ca)aI(C_a)_{a\in I} be a family of subsets of XX with CaC_a closed in XX for every aIa\in I. Let WW denote the set of all xXx\in X such that xCax\in C_a for every aIa\in I. A point xXx\in X fails to lie in WW precisely when there is some aIa\in I with xCax\notin C_a, that is, with xXCax\in X\setminus C_a. Therefore

XW=aI(XCa).X\setminus W=\bigcup_{a\in I}(X\setminus C_a).

The assignment aXCaa\mapsto X\setminus C_a is a family of subsets of XX indexed by II, and each of its members belongs to T\mathcal{T} because CaC_a is closed in XX. By condition 2 the displayed union belongs to T\mathcal{T}, so WW is closed in XX. In the degenerate case I=I=\varnothing this argument still applies: then W=XW=X and the displayed union is \varnothing, which belongs to T\mathcal{T} by condition 1.

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