Misplaced Pages

Intersection

The intersection of two sets ${\displaystyle A}$ and ${\displaystyle B,}$ represented by circles. ${\displaystyle A\cap B}$ is in red.
Type	Set operation
Field	Set theory
Statement	The intersection of ${\displaystyle A}$ and ${\displaystyle B}$ is the set ${\displaystyle A\cap B}$ of elements that lie in both set ${\displaystyle A}$ and set ${\displaystyle B}$.
Symbolic statement	${\displaystyle A\cap B=\{x:x\in A{\text{ and }}x\in B\}}$

In set theory, the intersection of two sets ${\displaystyle A}$ and ${\displaystyle B,}$ denoted by ${\displaystyle A\cap B,}$ is the set containing all elements of ${\displaystyle A}$ that also belong to ${\displaystyle B}$ or equivalently, all elements of ${\displaystyle B}$ that also belong to ${\displaystyle A.}$

Notation and terminology

Intersection is written using the symbol "${\displaystyle \cap }$" between the terms; that is, in infix notation. For example: $${\displaystyle \{1,2,3\}\cap \{2,3,4\}=\{2,3\}}$$ $${\displaystyle \{1,2,3\}\cap \{4,5,6\}=\varnothing }$$ $${\displaystyle \mathbb {Z} \cap \mathbb {N} =\mathbb {N} }$$ $${\displaystyle \{x\in \mathbb {R} :x^{2}=1\}\cap \mathbb {N} =\{1\}}$$ The intersection of more than two sets (generalized intersection) can be written as: $${\displaystyle \bigcap _{i=1}^{n}A_{i}}$$ which is similar to capital-sigma notation.

For an explanation of the symbols used in this article, refer to the table of mathematical symbols.

Definition

The intersection of two sets ${\displaystyle A}$ and ${\displaystyle B,}$ denoted by ${\displaystyle A\cap B}$, is the set of all objects that are members of both the sets ${\displaystyle A}$ and ${\displaystyle B.}$ In symbols: $${\displaystyle A\cap B=\{x:x\in A{\text{ and }}x\in B\}.}$$

That is, ${\displaystyle x}$ is an element of the intersection ${\displaystyle A\cap B}$ if and only if ${\displaystyle x}$ is both an element of ${\displaystyle A}$ and an element of ${\displaystyle B.}$

For example:

• The intersection of the sets {1, 2, 3} and {2, 3, 4} is {2, 3}.
• The number 9 is not in the intersection of the set of prime numbers {2, 3, 5, 7, 11, ...} and the set of odd numbers {1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, ...}, because 9 is not prime.

Intersecting and disjoint sets

We say that ${\displaystyle A}$ intersects (meets) ${\displaystyle B}$ if there exists some ${\displaystyle x}$ that is an element of both ${\displaystyle A}$ and ${\displaystyle B,}$ in which case we also say that ${\displaystyle A}$ intersects (meets) ${\displaystyle B}$ at ${\displaystyle x}$. Equivalently, ${\displaystyle A}$ intersects ${\displaystyle B}$ if their intersection ${\displaystyle A\cap B}$ is an inhabited set, meaning that there exists some ${\displaystyle x}$ such that ${\displaystyle x\in A\cap B.}$

We say that ${\displaystyle A}$ and ${\displaystyle B}$ are disjoint if ${\displaystyle A}$ does not intersect ${\displaystyle B.}$ In plain language, they have no elements in common. ${\displaystyle A}$ and ${\displaystyle B}$ are disjoint if their intersection is empty, denoted ${\displaystyle A\cap B=\varnothing .}$

For example, the sets ${\displaystyle \{1,2\}}$ and ${\displaystyle \{3,4\}}$ are disjoint, while the set of even numbers intersects the set of multiples of 3 at the multiples of 6.

Algebraic properties

Binary intersection is an associative operation; that is, for any sets ${\displaystyle A,B,}$ and ${\displaystyle C,}$ one has

$${\displaystyle A\cap (B\cap C)=(A\cap B)\cap C.}$$Thus the parentheses may be omitted without ambiguity: either of the above can be written as ${\displaystyle A\cap B\cap C}$. Intersection is also commutative. That is, for any ${\displaystyle A}$ and ${\displaystyle B,}$ one has$${\displaystyle A\cap B=B\cap A.}$$ The intersection of any set with the empty set results in the empty set; that is, that for any set ${\displaystyle A}$, $${\displaystyle A\cap \varnothing =\varnothing }$$ Also, the intersection operation is idempotent; that is, any set ${\displaystyle A}$ satisfies that ${\displaystyle A\cap A=A}$. All these properties follow from analogous facts about logical conjunction.

Intersection distributes over union and union distributes over intersection. That is, for any sets ${\displaystyle A,B,}$ and ${\displaystyle C,}$ one has $${\displaystyle {\begin{aligned}A\cap (B\cup C)=(A\cap B)\cup (A\cap C)\\A\cup (B\cap C)=(A\cup B)\cap (A\cup C)\end{aligned}}}$$ Inside a universe ${\displaystyle U,}$ one may define the complement ${\displaystyle A^{c}}$ of ${\displaystyle A}$ to be the set of all elements of ${\displaystyle U}$ not in ${\displaystyle A.}$ Furthermore, the intersection of ${\displaystyle A}$ and ${\displaystyle B}$ may be written as the complement of the union of their complements, derived easily from De Morgan's laws:$${\displaystyle A\cap B=\left(A^{c}\cup B^{c}\right)^{c}}$$

Arbitrary intersections

The most general notion is the intersection of an arbitrary nonempty collection of sets. If ${\displaystyle M}$ is a nonempty set whose elements are themselves sets, then ${\displaystyle x}$ is an element of the intersection of ${\displaystyle M}$ if and only if for every element ${\displaystyle A}$ of ${\displaystyle M,}$ ${\displaystyle x}$ is an element of ${\displaystyle A.}$ In symbols: $${\displaystyle \left(x\in \bigcap _{A\in M}A\right)\Leftrightarrow \left(\forall A\in M,\ x\in A\right).}$$

The notation for this last concept can vary considerably. Set theorists will sometimes write "${\displaystyle \bigcap M}$", while others will instead write "${\displaystyle {\bigcap }_{A\in M}A}$". The latter notation can be generalized to "${\displaystyle {\bigcap }_{i\in I}A_{i}}$", which refers to the intersection of the collection ${\displaystyle \left\{A_{i}:i\in I\right\}.}$ Here ${\displaystyle I}$ is a nonempty set, and ${\displaystyle A_{i}}$ is a set for every ${\displaystyle i\in I.}$

In the case that the index set ${\displaystyle I}$ is the set of natural numbers, notation analogous to that of an infinite product may be seen: $${\displaystyle \bigcap _{i=1}^{\infty }A_{i}.}$$

When formatting is difficult, this can also be written "${\displaystyle A_{1}\cap A_{2}\cap A_{3}\cap \cdots }$". This last example, an intersection of countably many sets, is actually very common; for an example, see the article on σ-algebras.

Nullary intersection

In the previous section, we excluded the case where ${\displaystyle M}$ was the empty set (${\displaystyle \varnothing }$). The reason is as follows: The intersection of the collection ${\displaystyle M}$ is defined as the set (see set-builder notation) $${\displaystyle \bigcap _{A\in M}A=\{x:{\text{ for all }}A\in M,x\in A\}.}$$ If ${\displaystyle M}$ is empty, there are no sets ${\displaystyle A}$ in ${\displaystyle M,}$ so the question becomes "which ${\displaystyle x}$'s satisfy the stated condition?" The answer seems to be every possible ${\displaystyle x}$. When ${\displaystyle M}$ is empty, the condition given above is an example of a vacuous truth. So the intersection of the empty family should be the universal set (the identity element for the operation of intersection), but in standard (ZF) set theory, the universal set does not exist.

However, when restricted to the context of subsets of a given fixed set ${\displaystyle X}$, the notion of the intersection of an empty collection of subsets of ${\displaystyle X}$ is well-defined. In that case, if ${\displaystyle M}$ is empty, its intersection is ${\displaystyle \bigcap M=\bigcap \varnothing =\{x\in X:x\in A{\text{ for all }}A\in \varnothing \}}$. Since all ${\displaystyle x\in X}$ vacuously satisfy the required condition, the intersection of the empty collection of subsets of ${\displaystyle X}$ is all of ${\displaystyle X.}$ In formulas, ${\displaystyle \bigcap \varnothing =X.}$ This matches the intuition that as collections of subsets become smaller, their respective intersections become larger; in the extreme case, the empty collection has an intersection equal to the whole underlying set.

Also, in type theory ${\displaystyle x}$ is of a prescribed type ${\displaystyle \tau ,}$ so the intersection is understood to be of type ${\displaystyle \mathrm {set} \ \tau }$ (the type of sets whose elements are in ${\displaystyle \tau }$), and we can define ${\displaystyle \bigcap _{A\in \emptyset }A}$ to be the universal set of ${\displaystyle \mathrm {set} \ \tau }$ (the set whose elements are exactly all terms of type ${\displaystyle \tau }$).

See also

• Algebra of sets – Identities and relationships involving sets
• Cardinality – Definition of the number of elements in a set
• Complement – Set of the elements not in a given subset
• Intersection (Euclidean geometry) – Shape formed from points common to other shapesPages displaying short descriptions of redirect targets
• Intersection graph – Graph representing intersections between given sets
• Intersection theory – Branch of algebraic geometry
• List of set identities and relations – Equalities for combinations of sets
• Logical conjunction – Logical connective AND
• MinHash – Data mining technique
• Naive set theory – Informal set theories
• Symmetric difference – Elements in exactly one of two sets
• Union – Set of elements in any of some sets

References

1. "Intersection of Sets". web.mnstate.edu. Archived from the original on 2020-08-04. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
2. "Stats: Probability Rules". People.richland.edu. Retrieved 2012-05-08.
3. ^ "Set Operations | Union | Intersection | Complement | Difference | Mutually Exclusive | Partitions | De Morgan's Law | Distributive Law | Cartesian Product". www.probabilitycourse.com. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
4. Megginson, Robert E. (1998). "Chapter 1". An introduction to Banach space theory. Graduate Texts in Mathematics. Vol. 183. New York: Springer-Verlag. pp. xx+596. ISBN 0-387-98431-3.

Further reading

• Devlin, K. J. (1993). The Joy of Sets: Fundamentals of Contemporary Set Theory (Second ed.). New York, NY: Springer-Verlag. ISBN 3-540-94094-4.
• Munkres, James R. (2000). "Set Theory and Logic". Topology (Second ed.). Upper Saddle River: Prentice Hall. ISBN 0-13-181629-2.
• Rosen, Kenneth (2007). "Basic Structures: Sets, Functions, Sequences, and Sums". Discrete Mathematics and Its Applications (Sixth ed.). Boston: McGraw-Hill. ISBN 978-0-07-322972-0.

External links

• Weisstein, Eric W. "Intersection". MathWorld.

v t e Set theory
Overview	Set (mathematics)
Axioms	Adjunction Choice countable dependent global Constructibility (V=L) Determinacy projective Extensionality Infinity Limitation of size Pairing Power set Regularity Union Martin's axiom Axiom schema replacement specification
Operations	Cartesian product Complement (i.e. set difference) De Morgan's laws Disjoint union Identities Intersection Power set Symmetric difference Union
Concepts Methods	Almost Cardinality Cardinal number (large) Class Constructible universe Continuum hypothesis Diagonal argument Element ordered pair tuple Family Forcing One-to-one correspondence Ordinal number Set-builder notation Transfinite induction Venn diagram
Set types	Amorphous Countable Empty Finite (hereditarily) Filter base subbase Ultrafilter Fuzzy Infinite (Dedekind-infinite) Recursive Singleton Subset · Superset Transitive Uncountable Universal
Theories	Alternative Axiomatic Naive Cantor's theorem Zermelo General Principia Mathematica New Foundations Zermelo–Fraenkel von Neumann–Bernays–Gödel Morse–Kelley Kripke–Platek Tarski–Grothendieck
Paradoxes Problems	Russell's paradox Suslin's problem Burali-Forti paradox
Set theorists	Paul Bernays Georg Cantor Paul Cohen Richard Dedekind Abraham Fraenkel Kurt Gödel Thomas Jech John von Neumann Willard Quine Bertrand Russell Thoralf Skolem Ernst Zermelo

v t e Mathematical logic
General	Axiom list Cardinality First-order logic Formal proof Formal semantics Foundations of mathematics Information theory Lemma Logical consequence Model Theorem Theory Type theory
Theorems (list)  and paradoxes	Gödel's completeness and incompleteness theorems Tarski's undefinability Banach–Tarski paradox Cantor's theorem, paradox and diagonal argument Compactness Halting problem Lindström's Löwenheim–Skolem Russell's paradox
Logics	Traditional Classical logic Logical truth Tautology Proposition Inference Logical equivalence Consistency Equiconsistency Argument Soundness Validity Syllogism Square of opposition Venn diagram Propositional Boolean algebra Boolean functions Logical connectives Propositional calculus Propositional formula Truth tables Many-valued logic 3 finite ∞ Predicate First-order list Second-order Monadic Higher-order Fixed-point Free Quantifiers Predicate Monadic predicate calculus
Set theory	Set hereditary Class (Ur-)Element Ordinal number Extensionality Forcing Relation equivalence partition Set operations: intersection union complement Cartesian product power set identities Types of sets Countable Uncountable Empty Inhabited Singleton Finite Infinite Transitive Ultrafilter Recursive Fuzzy Universal Universe constructible Grothendieck Von Neumann Maps and cardinality Function/Map domain codomain image In/Sur/Bi-jection Schröder–Bernstein theorem Isomorphism Gödel numbering Enumeration Large cardinal inaccessible Aleph number Operation binary Set theories Zermelo–Fraenkel axiom of choice continuum hypothesis General Kripke–Platek Morse–Kelley Naive New Foundations Tarski–Grothendieck Von Neumann–Bernays–Gödel Ackermann Constructive
Formal systems (list), language and syntax	Alphabet Arity Automata Axiom schema Expression ground Extension by definition conservative Relation Formation rule Grammar Formula atomic closed ground open Free/bound variable Language Metalanguage Logical connective ¬ ∨ ∧ → ↔ = Predicate functional variable propositional variable Proof Quantifier ∃ ! ∀ rank Sentence atomic spectrum Signature String Substitution Symbol function logical/constant non-logical variable Term Theory list Example axiomatic systems (list) of arithmetic: Peano second-order elementary function primitive recursive Robinson Skolem of the real numbers Tarski's axiomatization of Boolean algebras canonical minimal axioms of geometry: Euclidean: Elements Hilbert's Tarski's non-Euclidean Principia Mathematica
Proof theory	Formal proof Natural deduction Logical consequence Rule of inference Sequent calculus Theorem Systems axiomatic deductive Hilbert list Complete theory Independence (from ZFC) Proof of impossibility Ordinal analysis Reverse mathematics Self-verifying theories
Model theory	Interpretation function of models Model equivalence finite saturated spectrum submodel Non-standard model of arithmetic Diagram elementary Categorical theory Model complete theory Satisfiability Semantics of logic Strength Theories of truth semantic Tarski's Kripke's T-schema Transfer principle Truth predicate Truth value Type Ultraproduct Validity
Computability theory	Church encoding Church–Turing thesis Computably enumerable Computable function Computable set Decision problem decidable undecidable P NP P versus NP problem Kolmogorov complexity Lambda calculus Primitive recursive function Recursion Recursive set Turing machine Type theory
Related	Abstract logic Algebraic logic Automated theorem proving Category theory Concrete/Abstract category Category of sets History of logic History of mathematical logic timeline Logicism Mathematical object Philosophy of mathematics Supertask
Mathematics portal

• Basic concepts in set theory
• Operations on sets
• Intersection