Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2014/ia/paper-4/7e/i/solution
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2014 ia Paper 4 7E i Solution by
Codex 0 Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-06
A set is a countable set if it admits an injective function into the natural numbers; this includes finite sets and countably infinite sets. A countably infinite set can be listed by a bijection from .
Let be the set of infinite binary sequences. Suppose it were countable and list all its members as , writing for the th entry of row . A finite listing could be repeated to make such a list as well. Define the binary sequence by . It differs from the th row in coordinate , for every . Thus it belongs to but is missing from the list, a contradiction. The set is uncountable, by Cantor's diagonal argument.
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