[Math] Cardinality of a union of uncountable and countable set.

cardinals

Suppose you have a set A which has the same cardinality with real numbers R, which means |A| = |R|. Also suppose that you have a finite set B , which of course has finite cardinality. Also suppose A is a proper subset of A union B, I mean there are some objects which are not an element of A but they are an element of B.

Now is the cardinality of A union B greater than the cardinality of real numbers, also if so is this cardinality of A union B equal to cardinality of the power set of real numbers ?

Best Answer

The cardinality of the union is exactly the cardinality of $\mathbb R$. To see that, take the extreme case that $A$ and $B$ are disjoint and use the bijections $f:A\to R$ and $g:B\to \{0,\dots,k-1\}$ where $k=\lvert B\rvert \in \mathbb{N}$ to construct a bijection $\phi: A\cup B\to\mathbb{R}$ as follows: $$\phi(x) = \cases{ g(x) & for $x\in B$\\ f(x)+k & for $x\in A$ and $f(x)\in\mathbb{N}$\\ f(x) & for $x\in A$ and $f(x)\notin\mathbb{N}$ }$$ If $A\cap B\neq\emptyset$ then use the fact that $A\cup B=A\cup(B\setminus A)$ and do the same construction with $B\setminus A$ instead of $B$ (of course, then $k=\lvert B\setminus A\rvert$).

Note that a similar construction works also if $B$ is countable infinite. In that case, map $B$ to the odd numbers and replace $f(x)+k$ with $2f(x)$ for $f(x)\in \mathbb N$.