MAT-4601 Topology

Problem set I
Universidad San Francisco de Quito
Pablo Padilla (00211548)
Wednesday, January 27

Chapter 1

Section 1.1
Exercise 1. Let X = {a, b, c, d, e, f }. Determine whether or not each of the following
collections of subsets of X is a topology on X:
a) T1 = {X, ∅, {a}, {a, f }, {b, f }, {a, b, f }};
b) T2 = {X, ∅, {a, b, f }, {a, b, d}, {a, b, d, f }};
c) T3 = {X, ∅, {f }, {e, f }, {a, f }}
Solution:
a) Not a topology. As the intersection {a, f } ∩ {b, f } = {f } ∈
/ T1 .
b) Not a topology. The intersection {a, b, f } ∩ {a, b, d} = {a, b} ∈
/ T2 .
c) Not a topology. The union {e, f } ∪ {a, f } = {a, e, f } ∈
/ T3 .
Exercise 3. If X = {a, b, c, d, e, f } and T is the discrete topology on X, which of the
following statements are true?
Answer:
The true statements are:
a) X ∈ T , because X ∈ P(X) (and also the same argument as [b)]).
d) ∅ ∈ T because it’s a topology (and also the same argument as [a)]).
g) {a} ∈ T because {a} ⊆ X.
i) ∅ ⊆ X, because ∀x ∈ ∅, x ∈ X is vacuously true.

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 l) a ∈ X is trivial1 .
o) {X} ⊆ T this is true because a set is a subset of another set (in this case this
refers to families) iff all the elements of one set belong to the other. In this
case X ∈ {X} and X ∈ T .
Exercise 8. Let X be an infinite set and T a topology on X. If every infinite subset of X is
in T , prove that T is the discrete topology.
Proof:
Let x ∈ X so that X \ {x} is an infinite set, and thus X \ {x} ∈ T . As X \ {x} is
infinite, we can find2 two infinite disjoint subsets of X \{x}, let us name these subsets
V and W .
We are know completely sure that x ∈ / V and x ∈ / W and moreover, W and V are
infinite disjoint sets (so they belong to the topology T ). Observe now that W ∪ {x}
and V ∪ {x} are in T because they’re also infinite.
For the final act, recall that the intersection of two sets in a topology is also a member
of the topology, this implies that

(W ∪ {x}) ∩ (V ∪ {x}) = {x} ∈ T .

Which means that every singleton of X is in T , which furthermore implies that T

is the discrete topology by Proposition 1.1.9. 

Section 1.2
Exercise 3. Observe that if (X, T ) is a discrete space or an indiscrete space, then every open
set is a clopen set. Find a topology T on the set X = {a, b, c, d} which is not discrete and is
not indiscrete but has the property that every open set is clopen.’
Solution:
I had fear of this question, but it was actually pretty straightforward,

T = {X, ∅, {a, b}, {c, d}}.

Exercise 4. Let X be an infinite set. If T is a topology on X such that every infinite subset
of X is closed, prove that T is the discrete topology.
Proof:
1
In order not to be categorized as a mathematician that calls everything trivial and then walks
away, here’s a smiley face to avoid being rude ,.
2
By the axiom of choice.

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Let x ∈ X, such that {x} ⊆ X is a finite set with only one element. Clearly X \ {x}
is an infinite set and thus, it’s a closed set.
X \ {x} being closed implies that it’s complement X \ (X \ {x}) = {x} is open.
So, each singleton {x}, x ∈ X belongs to T , and thus T is the discrete topology by
Proposition 1.1.9. 

Section 1.3
Exercise 5. A topological space (X, T ) is said to be a T0 -space if for each pair of distinct
points a, b ∈ X, either there exists an open set containing a and not b, or there exists an open
set containing b and not a.
(i) Prove that every T1 -space is a T0 -space.
(ii) Which of (i)-(vi) in Exercise 3 above are T0 spaces?
(iii) Put a topology T on the set X = {0, 1} so that (X, T ) will be a T0 -space but not a
T1 -space.
(iv) Prove that each of the topological spaces described in (Ex. 1.1-6) is a T0 -space.