Doubt regarding greatest lower bound property implies least upper bound property

discrete mathematicselementary-set-theoryorder-theoryreal numbersreal-analysis

Least Upper Bound property – A set $X$ is said to have this property if every non empty subset $A$ of $X$ which is bounded above has the least upper bound. (This does not imply the least upper bound must belong to $A$, which is my inference from the definition of least upper bound)

The definition for the Greatest Lower Bound property is analogous.


Let $X=(0,1]$ and hence $( X, \leq)$ is a partially ordered set where $\leq$ has the usual meaning.

Now clearly $X$ has the least upper bound property as its closed above.

But if we take $A=X\subseteq X$ then what is the greatest lower bound of $A$?
How come then $X$ has the greatest lower bound property?

Best Answer

An ordered set $(X, \leq)$ has the greatest lower bound property if every non-empty subset of $X$ with a lower bound (in $X$) has a greatest lower bound (infimum) in $X$.

If we take $A = X = (0,1]$ then $A \subseteq X$ but there is no lower bound of $A$ in $X$ (note that $0 \notin X$), so $A$ is not a counter-example to the greatest lower bound property for $X = (0, 1]$.