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# Set (mathematics)  ( Concepts In Logic )

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A set is the mathematical model for a collection of different things;

(1995). 9788122408010, New Age International. .
(1986). 9780486652528, Courier Corporation. .
(2022). 9780262032933, MIT Press. .
a set contains elements or members, which can be mathematical objects of any kind: numbers, symbols, points in space, lines, other geometrical shapes, variables, or even other sets. The set with no element is the ; a set with a single element is a singleton. A set may have a finite number of elements or be an . Two sets are equal if they have precisely the same elements.
(1974). 9780716704577, W. H. Freeman and Company. .

Sets are ubiquitous in modern mathematics. Indeed, , more specifically Zermelo–Fraenkel set theory, has been the standard way to provide rigorous foundations for all branches of mathematics since the first half of the 20th century.

History
The concept of a set emerged in mathematics at the end of the 19th century.
(2007). 9783764383497, Birkhäuser Basel. .
The German word for set, Menge, was coined by in his work Paradoxes of the Infinite.
(2004). 9780191513701, OUP Oxford. .
(1996). 9780198505358, OUP Oxford. .
(2019). 9780192556837, OUP Oxford. .
, one of the founders of set theory, gave the following definition at the beginning of his Beiträge zur Begründung der transfiniten Mengenlehre:

called a set a class: (1903) The Principles of Mathematics, chapter VI: Classes

Naive set theory
The foremost property of a set is that it can have elements, also called members. Two sets are equal when they have the same elements. More precisely, sets A and B are equal if every element of A is an element of B, and every element of B is an element of A; this property is called the extensionality of sets.

The simple concept of a set has proved enormously useful in mathematics, but arise if no restrictions are placed on how sets can be constructed:

• Russell's paradox shows that the "set of all sets that do not contain themselves", i.e., , cannot exist.
• Cantor's paradox shows that "the set of all sets" cannot exist.

Naïve set theory defines a set as any collection of distinct elements, but problems arise from the vagueness of the term well-defined.

Axiomatic set theory
In subsequent efforts to resolve these paradoxes since the time of the original formulation of naïve set theory, the properties of sets have been defined by . Axiomatic set theory takes the concept of a set as a .
(2001). 9783764357498, Springer Science & Business Media. .
The purpose of the axioms is to provide a basic framework from which to deduce the truth or falsity of particular mathematical propositions (statements) about sets, using first-order logic. According to Gödel's incompleteness theorems however, it is not possible to use first-order logic to prove any such particular axiomatic set theory is free from paradox.

How sets are defined and set notation
Mathematical texts commonly denote sets by
(1997). 9780071368414, McGraw Hill Professional. .
in , such as , , . A set may also be called a collection or family, especially when its elements are themselves sets.

Roster notation
Roster or enumeration notation defines a set by listing its elements between , separated by commas:
(2009). 9781420069563, CRC Press. .
(2004). 9780716762973, W. H. Freeman. .
(2013). 9781133107422, Cengage Learning. .
(2010). 9780495391326, Cengage Learning. .
.

In a set, all that matters is whether each element is in it or not, so the ordering of the elements in roster notation is irrelevant (in contrast, in a , a , or a of a set, the ordering of the terms matters). For example, and represent the same set.

(2005). 9781439863756, CRC Press. .
(2014). 9781483150390, Elsevier Science. .

For sets with many elements, especially those following an implicit pattern, the list of members can be abbreviated using an ellipsis ''.

(2013). 9781285608433, Cengage Learning. .
(2013). 9780618951345, Cengage Learning. .
For instance, the set of the first thousand positive integers may be specified in roster notation as
.

Infinite sets in roster notation
An is a set with an endless list of elements. To describe an infinite set in roster notation, an ellipsis is placed at the end of the list, or at both ends, to indicate that the list continues forever. For example, the set of is
and the set of all is

Semantic definition
Another way to define a set is to use a rule to determine what the elements are:
Let be the set whose members are the first four positive .
Let be the set of colors of the French flag.

Such a definition is called a semantic description.

(2011). 9781441174130, Bloomsbury Publishing. .

Set-builder notation
Set-builder notation specifies a set as a selection from a larger set, determined by a condition on the elements.
(1990). 9780912675732, Rowman & Littlefield. .
For example, a set can be defined as follows:

$= \\left\{n \mid n \text\left\{ is an integer, and \right\} 0 \leq n \leq 19\\right\}.$

In this notation, the "|" means "such that", and the description can be interpreted as " is the set of all numbers such that is an integer in the range from 0 to 19 inclusive". Some authors use a colon ":" instead of the vertical bar.

(1987). 9780314295316, West Publishing Company. .

Classifying methods of definition
uses specific terms to classify types of definitions:
• An intensional definition uses a rule to determine membership. Semantic definitions and definitions using set-builder notation are examples.
• An extensional definition describes a set by listing all its elements. Such definitions are also called enumerative.
• An ostensive definition is one that describes a set by giving examples of elements; a roster involving an ellipsis would be an example.

Membership
If is a set and is an element of , this is written in shorthand as , which can also be read as " x belongs to B", or " x is in B". The statement " y is not an element of B" is written as , which can also be read as " y is not in B".
(2022). 9781852337810, Springer Science & Business Media. .

For example, with respect to the sets , , and ,

and ; and
and .

The empty set
The empty set (or null set) is the unique set that has no members. It is denoted or $\emptyset$ or
(1992). 9789622090262, Hong Kong University Press. .
or (or ).

Singleton sets
A singleton set is a set with exactly one element; such a set may also be called a unit set. Any such set can be written as , where x is the element. The set and the element x mean different things; Halmos draws the analogy that a box containing a hat is not the same as the hat.

Subsets
If every element of set A is also in B, then A is described as being a subset of B, or contained in B, written AB,
(2022). 9780821838358, American Mathematical Soc.. .
or BA.
(2010). 9781846282928, Springer Science & Business Media. .
The latter notation may be read B contains A, B includes A, or B is a superset of A. The relationship between sets established by ⊆ is called inclusion or containment. Two sets are equal if they contain each other: AB and BA is equivalent to A = B.

If A is a subset of B, but A is not equal to B, then A is called a proper subset of B. This can be written AB. Likewise, BA means B is a proper superset of A, i.e. B contains A, and is not equal to A.

A third pair of operators ⊂ and ⊃ are used differently by different authors: some authors use AB and BA to mean A is any subset of B (and not necessarily a proper subset), while others reserve AB and BA for cases where A is a proper subset of B.

Examples:

• The set of all humans is a proper subset of the set of all mammals.
• ⊂ .
• ⊆ .

The empty set is a subset of every set, and every set is a subset of itself:

• ∅ ⊆ A.
• AA.

Euler and Venn diagrams
An is a graphical representation of a collection of sets; each set is depicted as a planar region enclosed by a loop, with its elements inside. If is a subset of , then the region representing is completely inside the region representing . If two sets have no elements in common, the regions do not overlap.

A , in contrast, is a graphical representation of sets in which the loops divide the plane into zones such that for each way of selecting some of the sets (possibly all or none), there is a zone for the elements that belong to all the selected sets and none of the others. For example, if the sets are , , and , there should be a zone for the elements that are inside and and outside (even if such elements do not exist).

Special sets of numbers in mathematics
There are sets of such mathematical importance, to which mathematicians refer so frequently, that they have acquired special names and notational conventions to identify them.

Many of these important sets are represented in mathematical texts using bold (e.g. $\bold Z$) or (e.g. $\mathbb Z$) typeface.

(2003). 9781139439435, Cambridge University Press. .
These include
• $\bold N$ or $\mathbb N$, the set of all : $\bold N=\\left\{0,1,2,3,...\\right\}$ (often, authors exclude );
• $\bold Z$ or $\mathbb Z$, the set of all (whether positive, negative or zero): $\bold Z=\\left\{...,-2,-1,0,1,2,3,...\\right\}$;
• $\bold Q$ or $\mathbb Q$, the set of all (that is, the set of all and improper fractions): $\bold Q=\left\\left\{\frac \left\{a\right\}\left\{b\right\}\mid a,b\in\bold Z,b\ne0\right\\right\}$. For example, and ;
• $\bold R$ or $\mathbb R$, the set of all , including all rational numbers and all irrational numbers (which include such as $\sqrt2$ that cannot be rewritten as fractions, as well as transcendental numbers such as and );
• $\bold C$ or $\mathbb C$, the set of all : , for example, .

Each of the above sets of numbers has an infinite number of elements. Each is a subset of the sets listed below it.

Sets of positive or negative numbers are sometimes denoted by superscript plus and minus signs, respectively. For example, $\mathbf\left\{Q\right\}^+$ represents the set of positive rational numbers.

Functions
A function (or mapping) from a set to a set is a rule that assigns to each "input" element of an "output" that is an element of ; more formally, a function is a special kind of relation, one that relates each element of to exactly one element of . A function is called
• (or one-to-one) if it maps any two different elements of to different elements of ,
• (or onto) if for every element of , there is at least one element of that maps to it, and
• (or a one-to-one correspondence) if the function is both injective and surjective — in this case, each element of is paired with a unique element of , and each element of is paired with a unique element of , so that there are no unpaired elements.
An injective function is called an injection, a surjective function is called a surjection, and a bijective function is called a bijection or one-to-one correspondence.

Cardinality
The cardinality of a set , denoted , is the number of members of .
(1994). 9783540941804, Springer Science & Business Media. .
For example, if , then . Repeated members in roster notation are not counted,
(2022). 9789810245009, World Scientific. .
(2015). 9781939512079, The Mathematical Association of America. .
so , too.

More formally, two sets share the same cardinality if there exists a one-to-one correspondence between them.

The cardinality of the empty set is zero.

(2008). 9780495389132, Cengage Learning. .

Infinite sets and infinite cardinality
The list of elements of some sets is endless, or . For example, the set $\N$ of is infinite. In fact, all the special sets of numbers mentioned in the section above, are infinite. Infinite sets have infinite cardinality.

Some infinite cardinalities are greater than others. Arguably one of the most significant results from set theory is that the set of has greater cardinality than the set of natural numbers.

(2013). 9783319015774, Springer Science & Business Media. .
Sets with cardinality less than or equal to that of $\N$ are called ; these are either finite sets or countably infinite sets (sets of the same cardinality as $\N$); some authors use "countable" to mean "countably infinite". Sets with cardinality strictly greater than that of $\N$ are called .

However, it can be shown that the cardinality of a (i.e., the number of points on a line) is the same as the cardinality of any of that line, of the entire plane, and indeed of any finite-dimensional .

(2006). 9780306472039, Springer Science & Business Media. .

The Continuum Hypothesis
The Continuum Hypothesis, formulated by Georg Cantor in 1878, is the statement that there is no set with cardinality strictly between the and the cardinality of a straight line. In 1963, proved that the Continuum Hypothesis is independent of the axiom system ZFC consisting of Zermelo–Fraenkel set theory with the axiom of choice.

(ZFC is the most widely-studied version of axiomatic set theory.)

Power sets
The power set of a set is the set of all subsets of . The and itself are elements of the power set of , because these are both subsets of . For example, the power set of is . The power set of a set is commonly written as or .

If has elements, then has elements. For example, has three elements, and its power set has elements, as shown above.

If is infinite (whether or ), then is uncountable. Moreover, the power set is always strictly "bigger" than the original set, in the sense that any attempt to pair up the elements of with the elements of will leave some elements of unpaired. (There is never a from onto .)

(2004). 9781931914413, Springer Science & Business Media. .

Partitions
A partition of a set S is a set of nonempty subsets of S, such that every element x in S is in exactly one of these subsets. That is, the subsets are pairwise disjoint (meaning any two sets of the partition contain no element in common), and the union of all the subsets of the partition is S.
(2012). 9781439863336, CRC Press. .

Basic operations
There are several fundamental operations for constructing new sets from given sets.

Unions
Two sets can be joined: the union of and , denoted by , is the set of all things that are members of A or of B or of both.

Examples:

Some basic properties of unions:

• if and only if

Intersections
A new set can also be constructed by determining which members two sets have "in common". The intersection of A and B, denoted by is the set of all things that are members of both A and B. If then A and B are said to be disjoint.

Examples:

Some basic properties of intersections:

• if and only if

Complements
Two sets can also be "subtracted". The relative complement of B in A (also called the set-theoretic difference of A and B), denoted by (or ), is the set of all elements that are members of A, but not members of B. It is valid to "subtract" members of a set that are not in the set, such as removing the element green from the set ; doing so will not affect the elements in the set.

In certain settings, all sets under discussion are considered to be subsets of a given universal set U. In such cases, is called the absolute complement or simply complement of A, and is denoted by A′ or Ac.

Examples:

• If U is the set of integers, E is the set of even integers, and O is the set of odd integers, then U \ E = E′ = O.

Some basic properties of complements include the following:

• for .
• and
• and
• .
• if then

An extension of the complement is the symmetric difference, defined for sets A, B as

$A\,\Delta\,B = \left(A \setminus B\right) \cup \left(B \setminus A\right).$
For example, the symmetric difference of and is the set . The power set of any set becomes a with symmetric difference as the addition of the ring (with the empty set as neutral element) and intersection as the multiplication of the ring.

Cartesian product
A new set can be constructed by associating every element of one set with every element of another set. The Cartesian product of two sets A and B, denoted by A × B, is the set of all ( a, b) such that a is a member of A and b is a member of B.

Examples:

Some basic properties of Cartesian products: Let A and B be finite sets; then the cardinality of the Cartesian product is the product of the cardinalities:

• | A × B| = | B × A| = | A| × | B|.

Applications
Sets are ubiquitous in modern mathematics. For example, structures in , such as groups, fields and rings, are sets closed under one or more operations.

One of the main applications of naive set theory is in the construction of relations. A relation from a domain to a is a subset of the Cartesian product . For example, considering the set of shapes in the game of the same name, the relation "beats" from to is the set ; thus beats in the game if the pair is a member of . Another example is the set of all pairs , where is real. This relation is a subset of , because the set of all squares is subset of the set of all real numbers. Since for every in , one and only one pair is found in , it is called a function. In functional notation, this relation can be written as .

Principle of inclusion and exclusion
The inclusion–exclusion principle is a counting technique that can be used to count the number of elements in a union of two sets—if the size of each set and the size of their intersection are known. It can be expressed symbolically as
$|A \cup B| = |A| + |B| - |A \cap B|.$

A more general form of the principle can be used to find the cardinality of any finite union of sets:

\begin\left\{align\right\}
\left|A_{1}\cup A_{2}\cup A_{3}\cup\ldots\cup A_{n}\right|=& \left(\left|A_{1}\right|+\left|A_{2}\right|+\left|A_{3}\right|+\ldots\left|A_{n}\right|\right) \\ &{} - \left(\left|A_{1}\cap A_{2}\right|+\left|A_{1}\cap A_{3}\right|+\ldots\left|A_{n-1}\cap A_{n}\right|\right) \\ &{} + \ldots \\ &{} + \left(-1\right)^{n-1}\left(\left|A_{1}\cap A_{2}\cap A_{3}\cap\ldots\cap A_{n}\right|\right). \end{align}

De Morgan's laws
Augustus De Morgan stated two laws about sets.

If and are any two sets then,

The complement of union equals the complement of intersected with the complement of .
The complement of intersected with is equal to the complement of union to the complement of .

Notes

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