In
set theory
Set theory is the branch of mathematical logic that studies sets, which can be informally described as collections of objects. Although objects of any kind can be collected into a set, set theory, as a branch of mathematics, is mostly concern ...
, the cardinality of the continuum is the
cardinality
In mathematics, the cardinality of a set is a measure of the number of elements of the set. For example, the set A = \ contains 3 elements, and therefore A has a cardinality of 3. Beginning in the late 19th century, this concept was generalized ...
or "size" of the
set
Set, The Set, SET or SETS may refer to:
Science, technology, and mathematics Mathematics
*Set (mathematics), a collection of elements
*Category of sets, the category whose objects and morphisms are sets and total functions, respectively
Electro ...
of
real numbers
In mathematics, a real number is a number that can be used to measure a ''continuous'' one-dimensional quantity such as a distance, duration or temperature. Here, ''continuous'' means that values can have arbitrarily small variations. Every re ...
, sometimes called the
continuum. It is an
infinite cardinal number
In mathematics, cardinal numbers, or cardinals for short, are a generalization of the natural numbers used to measure the cardinality (size) of sets. The cardinality of a finite set is a natural number: the number of elements in the set. The ...
and is denoted by
(lowercase
fraktur "c") or
.
The real numbers
are more numerous than the
natural numbers
In mathematics, the natural numbers are those numbers used for counting (as in "there are ''six'' coins on the table") and ordering (as in "this is the ''third'' largest city in the country").
Numbers used for counting are called '' cardinal ...
. Moreover,
has the same number of elements as the
power set
In mathematics, the power set (or powerset) of a set is the set of all subsets of , including the empty set and itself. In axiomatic set theory (as developed, for example, in the ZFC axioms), the existence of the power set of any set is pos ...
of
Symbolically, if the cardinality of
is denoted as
, the cardinality of the continuum is
This was proven by
Georg Cantor
Georg Ferdinand Ludwig Philipp Cantor ( , ; – January 6, 1918) was a German mathematician. He played a pivotal role in the creation of set theory, which has become a fundamental theory in mathematics. Cantor established the importance o ...
in his
uncountability proof of 1874, part of his groundbreaking study of different infinities. The inequality was later stated more simply in his
diagonal argument in 1891. Cantor defined cardinality in terms of
bijective function
In mathematics, a bijection, also known as a bijective function, one-to-one correspondence, or invertible function, is a function between the elements of two sets, where each element of one set is paired with exactly one element of the other s ...
s: two sets have the same cardinality if, and only if, there exists a bijective function between them.
Between any two real numbers ''a'' < ''b'', no matter how close they are to each other, there are always infinitely many other real numbers, and Cantor showed that they are as many as those contained in the whole set of real numbers. In other words, the
open interval
In mathematics, a (real) interval is a set of real numbers that contains all real numbers lying between any two numbers of the set. For example, the set of numbers satisfying is an interval which contains , , and all numbers in between. Other ...
(''a'',''b'') is
equinumerous with
This is also true for several other infinite sets, such as any ''n''-dimensional
Euclidean space
Euclidean space is the fundamental space of geometry, intended to represent physical space. Originally, that is, in Euclid's ''Elements'', it was the three-dimensional space of Euclidean geometry, but in modern mathematics there are Euclidean ...
(see
space filling curve). That is,
The smallest infinite cardinal number is
(
aleph-null). The second smallest is
(
aleph-one). The
continuum hypothesis
In mathematics, the continuum hypothesis (abbreviated CH) is a hypothesis about the possible sizes of infinite sets. It states that
or equivalently, that
In Zermelo–Fraenkel set theory with the axiom of choice (ZFC), this is equivalent to ...
, which asserts that there are no sets whose cardinality is strictly between
and means that
.
The truth or falsity of this hypothesis is undecidable and
cannot be proven within the widely used
Zermelo–Fraenkel set theory with axiom of choice (ZFC).
Properties
Uncountability
Georg Cantor
Georg Ferdinand Ludwig Philipp Cantor ( , ; – January 6, 1918) was a German mathematician. He played a pivotal role in the creation of set theory, which has become a fundamental theory in mathematics. Cantor established the importance o ...
introduced the concept of
cardinality
In mathematics, the cardinality of a set is a measure of the number of elements of the set. For example, the set A = \ contains 3 elements, and therefore A has a cardinality of 3. Beginning in the late 19th century, this concept was generalized ...
to compare the sizes of infinite sets. He famously showed that the set of real numbers is
uncountably infinite. That is,
is strictly greater than the cardinality of the
natural numbers
In mathematics, the natural numbers are those numbers used for counting (as in "there are ''six'' coins on the table") and ordering (as in "this is the ''third'' largest city in the country").
Numbers used for counting are called '' cardinal ...
,
:
In practice, this means that there are strictly more real numbers than there are integers. Cantor proved this statement in several different ways. For more information on this topic, see
Cantor's first uncountability proof and
Cantor's diagonal argument
In set theory, Cantor's diagonal argument, also called the diagonalisation argument, the diagonal slash argument, the anti-diagonal argument, the diagonal method, and Cantor's diagonalization proof, was published in 1891 by Georg Cantor as a m ...
.
Cardinal equalities
A variation of Cantor's diagonal argument can be used to prove
Cantor's theorem, which states that the cardinality of any set is strictly less than that of its
power set
In mathematics, the power set (or powerset) of a set is the set of all subsets of , including the empty set and itself. In axiomatic set theory (as developed, for example, in the ZFC axioms), the existence of the power set of any set is pos ...
. That is,
(and so that the power set
of the
natural number
In mathematics, the natural numbers are those numbers used for counting (as in "there are ''six'' coins on the table") and ordering (as in "this is the ''third'' largest city in the country").
Numbers used for counting are called ''cardinal n ...
s
is uncountable). In fact, one can show that the cardinality of
is equal to
as follows:
#Define a map
from the reals to the power set of the
rationals
In mathematics, a rational number is a number that can be expressed as the quotient or fraction of two integers, a numerator and a non-zero denominator . For example, is a rational number, as is every integer (e.g. ). The set of all rati ...
,
, by sending each real number
to the set
of all rationals less than or equal to
(with the reals viewed as
Dedekind cuts, this is nothing other than the
inclusion map
In mathematics, if A is a subset of B, then the inclusion map (also inclusion function, insertion, or canonical injection) is the function \iota that sends each element x of A to x, treated as an element of B:
\iota : A\rightarrow B, \qquad \iota( ...
in the set of sets of rationals). Because the rationals are
dense
Density (volumetric mass density or specific mass) is the substance's mass per unit of volume. The symbol most often used for density is ''ρ'' (the lower case Greek letter rho), although the Latin letter ''D'' can also be used. Mathematical ...
in
, this map is
injective
In mathematics, an injective function (also known as injection, or one-to-one function) is a function that maps distinct elements of its domain to distinct elements; that is, implies . (Equivalently, implies in the equivalent contrapositi ...
, and because the rationals are countable, we have that
.
#Let
be the set of infinite
sequence
In mathematics, a sequence is an enumerated collection of objects in which repetitions are allowed and order matters. Like a set, it contains members (also called ''elements'', or ''terms''). The number of elements (possibly infinite) is call ...
s with values in set
. This set has cardinality
(the natural
bijection
In mathematics, a bijection, also known as a bijective function, one-to-one correspondence, or invertible function, is a function between the elements of two sets, where each element of one set is paired with exactly one element of the other s ...
between the set of binary sequences and
is given by the
indicator function
In mathematics, an indicator function or a characteristic function of a subset of a set is a function that maps elements of the subset to one, and all other elements to zero. That is, if is a subset of some set , one has \mathbf_(x)=1 if x\i ...
). Now, associate to each such sequence
the unique real number in the
interval