Real Analysis – Understanding the limit of the function $f(x) = \begin{cases} 1 & \text{if } x = 1 \\ 0 & \text{otherwise} \end{cases}$

limitsreal numbersreal-analysis

Consider function $f(x) = \begin{cases}
1 & \text{if } x = 1 \\
0 & \text{otherwise}
\end{cases}
$

I am trying to find limit of this function when $x \to 1$. By two-sided limit theorem, it can concluded $$\lim_{x \to 1^{-}}f(x) = \lim_{x \to1^{+}}f(x) = 0 \implies \lim_{x \to 1}f(x) = 0.$$

But when trying to apply the definition of the limit there is a problem: we want to bound $|f(x) – 0| = |f(x)|$ by $\epsilon$, $|x – 1| < \delta$ and when $x = 1$ we have $|f(x)| = 1$ which is not bounded for any $\epsilon > 0$. The question is: does the limit even exist?

Best Answer

Where you wrote $|x-1|<\delta,$ you need $0<|x-1|<\delta.$

I.e. you can make $f(x)$ as close to the limit as you want by making $x$ close enough, but not equal, to $1.$