Real Analysis – Linear Bijection Between Banach Spaces

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It is well-known that, by Banach theorem, every continuous, linear and bijective operator between Banach spaces is a isomorphism. There must be a linear bijective and discontinuous operator between Banach spaces! How can we show/construct such a map?

Thanks for all helpings!

Best Answer

Take any infinite-dimensional Banach space and choose its Hamel basis $\left(e_i\right)_{i\in I}$, say, with $\left\|e_i\right\|=1$. Define $f\colon X \to X$ by

$$ f(e_i) = \alpha_i e_i $$

where ${\alpha_i}$ is any unbounded collection of (nonzero) numbers. Clearly $f$ is a bijection, and $f$ is unbounded, hence discontinuous.

Now, the above relies critically on the Axiom of Choice. If I recall correctly, there was a similar question here, and it's been pointed out that in certain models with negation of Axiom of Choice there are no discontinuous linear maps from Banach spaces to normed linear spaces at all. So there can be no "truly constructive" example.

It's probably a bit off-topic, but such natural examples exist for incomplete normed linear spaces. A well-known one is a derivative operator for $C^\infty\left([0,1]\right)$ with supremum norm. It's not injective, but it is on a quotient by subspace of constant functions.

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