… and now for something

completely different…

Set Theory
Actually, you will see that logic
and set theory are very closely
related.

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 Set Theory
• Set: Collection of objects (“elements”)
• aA “a is an element of A”
“a is a member of A”
• aA “a is not an element of A”
• A = {a1, a2, …, an} “A contains…”
• Order of elements is meaningless
• It does not matter how often the same
element is listed.

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 Set Equality
Sets A and B are equal if and only if they
contain exactly the same elements.
Examples:
• A = {9, 2, 7, -3}, B = {7, 9, -3, 2} : A=B
• A = {dog, cat, horse},
B = {cat, horse, squirrel, dog} : AB
• A = {dog, cat, horse},
B = {cat, horse, dog, dog} : A=B

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 Examples for Sets

“Standard” Sets:
• Natural numbers N = {0, 1, 2, 3, …}
• Integers Z = {…, -2, -1, 0, 1, 2, …}
• Positive Integers Z+ = {1, 2, 3, 4, …}
• Real Numbers R = {47.3, -12, , …}
• Rational Numbers Q = {1.5, 2.6, -3.8, 15,
…}
(correct definition will follow)

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 Examples for Sets
• A= “empty set/null set”
• A = {z} Note: zA, but z 
{z}
• A = {{b, c}, {c, x, d}}
• A = {{x, y}}
Note: {x, y} A, but {x, y}  {{x, y}}
• A = {x | P(x)}
“set of all x such that P(x)”
• A = {x | xN  x > 7} = {8, 9, 10, …}
“set builder notation”
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 Examples for Sets
We are now able to define the set of rational
numbers Q:
Q = {a/b | aZ  bZ+}
or
Q = {a/b | aZ  bZ  b0}

And how about the set of real numbers R?

R = {r | r is a real number}
That is the best we can do.
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 Subsets
AB “A is a subset of B”
A  B if and only if every element of A is also
an element of B.
We can completely formalize this:
A  B  x (xA  xB)

Examples:

A = {3, 9}, B = {5, 9, 1, 3}, A true

B?
A = {3, 3, 3, 9}, B = {5, 9, 1, 3}, A true
B?
A = {1, 2, 3}, B = {2, 3, 4}, A false
 01/24/25
B? 7
 Subsets
Useful rules:
• A = B  (A  B)  (B  A)
• (A  B)  (B  C)  A  C (see Venn Diagram)

B
A C

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 Subsets
Useful rules:
   A for any set A
• A  A for any set A

Proper subsets:
AB “A is a proper subset of B”
A  B  x (xA  xB)  x (xB  xA)
or
A  B  x (xA  xB)  x (xB  xA)

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 Cardinality of Sets
If a set S contains n distinct elements, nN,
we call S a finite set with cardinality n.

Examples:
A = {Mercedes, BMW, Porsche}, |A| = 3
B = {1, {2, 3}, {4, 5}, 6} |B| =
C= 4
|C| = 0
D = { xN | x  7000 } |D| = 7001
E = { xN | x  7000 } E is infinite!

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 The Power Set
P(A) “power set of A”
P(A) = {B | B  A} (contains all subsets of A)

Examples:
A = {x, y, z}
P(A) = {, {x}, {y}, {z}, {x, y}, {x, z}, {y, z},
{x, y, z}}

A=
P(A) = {}
Note: |A| = 0, |P(A)| = 1
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 The Power Set
Cardinality of power sets:
| P(A) | = 2|A|
• Imagine each element in A has an “on/off” switch
• Each possible switch configuration in A
corresponds to one element in 2A

A 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
x x x x x x x x x
y y y y y y y y y
z z z z z z z z z
• For 3 elements in A, there are
222 = 8 elements in P(A)
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 Cartesian Product
The ordered n-tuple (a1, a2, a3, …, an) is an
ordered collection of objects.
Two ordered n-tuples (a1, a2, a3, …, an) and
(b1, b2, b3, …, bn) are equal if and only if they
contain exactly the same elements in the same
order, i.e. ai = bi for 1  i  n.

The Cartesian product of two sets is defined as:

AB = {(a, b) | aA  bB}
Example: A = {x, y}, B = {a, b, c}
AB = {(x, a), (x, b), (x, c), (y, a), (y, b), (y, c)}
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 Cartesian Product
The Cartesian product of two sets is defined
as: AB = {(a, b) | aA  bB}
Example:
A = {good, bad}, B = {student, prof}

AB = (good,
{ student),(good, prof), (bad, student),(bad, prof)}

BA = (student, good),(prof, good), (student, bad),(prof, bad)}

{

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 Cartesian Product
Note that:
• A = 
• A = 
• For non-empty sets A and B: AB  AB  BA
• |AB| = |A||B|

The Cartesian product of two or more sets is

defined as:
A1A2…An = {(a1, a2, …, an) | aiAi for 1  i 
n}
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 Set Operations

Union: AB = {x | xA  xB}

Example: A = {a, b}, B = {b, c, d}

AB = {a, b, c, d}

Intersection: AB = {x | xA  xB}

Example: A = {a, b}, B = {b, c, d}

AB = {b}

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 Set Operations

Two sets are called disjoint if their intersection

is empty, that is, they share no elements:
A B = 

The difference between two sets A and B

contains exactly those elements of A that are
not in B:
A-B = {x | xA  xB}
Example: A = {a, b}, B = {b, c, d}, A-B = {a}

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 Set Operations
The complement of a set A contains exactly
those elements under consideration that are
not in A:
Ac = U-A

Example: U = N, B = {250, 251, 252, …}

Bc = {0, 1, 2, …, 248, 249}

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 Set Operations
Table 1 in Section 1.5 shows many useful
equations.
How can we prove A(BC) = (AB)(AC)?
Method I:
xA(BC)
 xA  x(BC)
 xA  (xB  xC)
 (xA  xB)  (xA  xC)
(distributive law for logical expressions)
 x(AB)  x(AC)
 x(AB)(AC)
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 Set Operations
Method II: Membership table
1 means “x is an element of this set”
0 means “x is not an element of this set”
A B C BC A(BC) A B A C (AB) (AC)
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0
0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0
0 1 1 1 1 1 1 1
1 0 0 0 1 1 1 1
1 0 1 0 1 1 1 1
1 1 0 0 1 1 1 1
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1
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 Set Operations

Every logical expression can be transformed

into an equivalent expression in set theory and
vice versa.

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