$f$ is uniformly continuous on $X$ if and only if $d(x_n,z_n)\to0\implies\rho(f(x_n),f(z_n))\to0.$

399 Views Asked by At

Let $(X,d)$ and $(Y,\rho)$ be metric spaces and $f:X\to Y$.

Prove that $f$ is uniformly continuous on $X$ if and only if for any sequences $(x_n)$ and $(z_n)$ in $X$, $$d(x_n,z_n)\to0\implies\rho(f(x_n),f(z_n))\to0.$$

I know that $f$ is uniformly continuous on $X$ if $\forall\epsilon>0, \exists\delta>0$ such that $d(x,x')<\delta\implies\rho(f(x),f(x'))<\epsilon$. It seems that we can apply it directly to prove the question by changing $x$ with $x_n$ and $x'$ with $z_n$ and choose $\delta=\epsilon$ since it converges to 0. I am not sure whether my reasoning is correct? Can anyone please lend me some help?

Also, I am tempted to use Cauchy, but it is not exactly Cauchy.

Any ideas how to write the proof?

Thank you for the helps!

1

There are 1 best solutions below

0
On BEST ANSWER

The direction "uniform continuity implies the sequence property" is a bit sloppy.

Suppose $d(x_n, z_n) \rightarrow 0$. We want to show that $\rho(f(x_n), f(z_n)) \rightarrow 0$. So pick $\varepsilon > 0$. Then pick $\delta > 0$ from the definition of uniform continuity of $f$. Then there is some $N$ such that

$$\forall n \ge N: \left| d(x_n, z_n) - 0 \right| = d(x_n, z_n) < \delta $$

so for that same $N$

$$\forall n \ge N: \rho(f(x_n), f(z_n)) = \left| \rho(f(x_n), f(z_n)) - 0 \right| < \varepsilon$$

as required.

Now suppose the sequence condition holds for $f$. And suppose $f$ is not uniformly contininuous. This means that (using logical negation):

$$\exists \varepsilon > 0: \forall \delta > 0: \lnot\left(\forall x,x' \in X : d(x, x') < \delta \rightarrow \rho(f(x), f(x')) < \varepsilon\right)$$

which we can rewrite (because an implication is only false when the left side is true and the right side is false) as

$$\exists \varepsilon > 0: \forall \delta > 0: \left( \exists x,x' \in X: d(x,x') < \delta \land \rho(f(x), f(x') \ge \varepsilon \right)$$

So we have this fixed $\varepsilon$ and we can pick arbitrarily close points in $X$ that have images always at least $\varepsilon$ apart. In particular we can pick points $x_n, z_n$ with this property and such that $d(x_n, z_n) < \frac{1}{n}$. Now the $(x_n), (z_n)$ have the property needed for the sequence property (their distances converge to $0$), but the sequences of their images are always $\varepsilon$ apart, so definitely their distances in $Y$ do not converge to $0$. This contradicts the sequence condition, so $f$ must be uniformly continuous.