Cantor Set

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CANTOR SET

The picture below shows the first four steps of this process:

The cantor set is:

Another explicit formula for Cantor set is:


1. C is non-empty
By Nested-intervals theorem, C is non-empty.

2. C is closed and compact


The Cantor set C is defined as:

Each Ci is closed. Since the arbitrary intersection of closed sets is closed, therefore, C is closed.
Also, C is bounded in [ -1, 1], therefore, it is compact.

3. Cantor set is perfect


One way to do this is to note that each of the sets An can be written as a finite union of 2n closed
intervals, each of which has a length of 1 / 3n, as follows:
 A0 = [0, 1]
 A1 = [0, 1/3] [2/3, 1]
 A2 = [0, 1/9] [2/9, 3/9] [6/9, 7/9] [8/9, 1]
 ...
Note that all endpoints of every subinterval will be contained in the Cantor set. Now take
any x C = An. Then x is in An for all n. If x is in An, then x must be contained in one of
the 2 n intervals that comprise the set An. Define x n to be the left endpoint of that subinterval (if x is
equal to that endpoint, then let x n be equal to the right endpoint of that subinterval). Since each
subinterval has length 1 / 3n, we have:
 | x – xn | < 1 / 3n
Hence, the sequence { xn } converges to x, and since all endpoints of the subintervals are contained
in the Cantor set, we have found a sequence of numbers contained in C that converges to x.
Therefore, x is a limit point of C. But since x was arbitrary, every point of C is a limit point.
Since C is also closed, it is then perfect.
4. Cantor set is uncountable
The Cantor set C is defined as:

Observe that C is the set of all numbers in [0, 1] which have non-terminating ternary expansion
containing only the digits 0 and 2. Moreover, this non-terminating ternary expansion of each
number is unique.
5. Cantor set is nowhere dense
The closure of the Cantor set is the same Cantor set, for it is closed. The interior of the Cantor set
is empty, since it contains no interval. Thus, the Cantor set is nowhere dense: its closure has empty
interior.
6. Cantor set has zero measure (length)
To form the Cantor set, we "removed":

1 interval of length 1/3


2 intervals of length 1/9

All in all, you removed disjoint intervals of total length

Since everything's happening in the unit interval, what is left of it after the above
removal, i.e. Cantor's set, has length 1 – 1 = 0.

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