Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-metric-spaces-and-complex-analysis-course-of-the-university-of-oxford/2023/1/b/i/solution
Past exam of the metric spaces and complex analysis course of the University of Oxford 2023 1 b i Solution by
Codex 0 2026-10-25
Write , so that is the Hausdorff distance. Since is a bounded set, there is a finite with . Nonemptiness of therefore gives , so is finite. Its symmetry and nonnegativity are immediate, as is .
If , then every has zero distance to a set . Since is a closed set, part (a)(iii) gives . Interchanging the sets gives . Thus implies . Closedness is essential here: without it a set and its closure have Hausdorff distance zero.
For the triangle inequality, fix and . The approximation property of an infimum supplies with , and then with . Consequently,Let and take the supremum over to obtain . Applying this inequality in the reverse direction as well yieldsAll metric axioms follow. Boundedness was used to ensure finiteness, and closedness to distinguish different sets; neither was needed for the triangle inequality.
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