Open maps which are not continuous

Question

What is an example of an open map $(0,1) \to \mathbb{R}$ which is not continuous? Is it even possible for one to exist? What about in higher dimensions? The simplest example I've been able to think of is the map $e^{1/z}$ from $\mathbb{C}$ to $\mathbb{C}$ (filled in to be $0$ at $0$). There must be a simpler example, using the usual Euclidean topology, right?

Answer 1

Explicit examples are moderately difficult to construct, but it’s not too hard to come up with non-constructive examples; here’s one such.

For $x,y\in\mathbb{R}$ define $x\sim y$ iff $x-y\in \mathbb{Q}$; it’s easy to check that $\sim$ is an equivalence relation on $\mathbb{R}$. For any $x\in\mathbb{R}$, $[x] = \{x+q:q\in\mathbb{Q}\}$, where $[x]$ is the $\sim$-equivalence class of $x$. In particular, each equivalence class is countable. For any infinite cardinal $\kappa$, the union of $\kappa$ pairwise disjoint countably infinite sets has cardinality $\kappa$, so there must be exactly as many equivalence classes as there are real numbers. Let $h$ be a bijection from $\mathbb{R}/\sim$, the set of equivalence classes, to $\mathbb{R}$. Finally, define $$f:(0,1)\to\mathbb{R}:x\mapsto h([x])\;.$$

I claim that if $V$ is any non-empty open subset of $(0,1)$, $f[V]=\mathbb{R}$, which of course ensures that $f$ is open. To see this, just observe that every open interval in $(0,1)$ intersects every equivalence class. (It should be no trouble at all to see that $f$ is wildly discontinuous!)