In mathematics, a filter on a set is a collection of nonempty subsets which is closed under taking supersets and finite intersections. An example of a filter is the collection of neighborhoods of a point in a topological space.
is closed under finite intersections: ,, and if and then .
A proper (or non-degenerate) filter is a filter which is proper as a subset of the powerset (i.e., the only improper filter is , consisting of all possible subsets). By upwards-closure, a filter is proper if and only if it does not contain the empty set. Many authors adopt the convention that a filter must be proper by definition.
When and are two filters on the same set such that holds, is said to be coarser than (or a subfilter of ) while is said to be finer than (or subordinate to or a superfilter of ).
Examples
The singleton set is called the trivial or indiscrete filter on .
If is a subset of , the subsets of which are supersets of form a principal filter.
Many examples arise from various "largeness" conditions:
If is a set, the set of all cofinite subsets of (i.e., those sets whose complement in is finite) is a filter on , the Fréchet filter (or cofinite filter).
Similarly, if is a set, the cocountable subsets of (those whose complement is countable) form a filter, the cocountable filter which is finer than the Fréchet filter. More generally, for any infinite cardinal, the subsets whose complement has cardinality at most form a filter.
If is a metric space, e.g., , the co-bounded subsets of (those whose complement is bounded set) form a filter on .
If is a complete measure space (e.g., with the Lebesgue measure), the conull subsets of , i.e., the subsets whose complement has measure zero, form a filter on . (For a non-complete measure space, one can take the subsets which, while not necessarily measurable, are contained in a measurable subset of measure zero.)
Similarly, if is a measure space, the subsets whose complement is contained in a measurable subset of finite measure form a filter on .
If is a family of filters on and is a filter on then is a filter on called Kowalsky's filter.
Principal and free filters
The kernel of a filter on is the intersection of all the subsets of in .
A filter on is principal (or atomic) when it has a particularly simple form: it contains exactly the supersets of , for some fixed subset . When , this yields the improper filter. When is a singleton, this filter (which consists of all subsets that contain ) is called the fundamental filter (or discrete filter) associated with .
A filter is principal if and only if the kernel of is an element of , and when this is the case, consists of the supersets of its kernel. On a finite set, every filter is principal (since the intersection defining the kernel is finite).
A filter is said to be free when it has empty kernel, otherwise it is fixed (and if is an element of the kernel, it is fixed by ). A filter on a set is free if and only if it contains the Fréchet filter on .
Two filters and on mesh when every member of intersects every member of . For every filter on , there exists a unique pair of filters (the free part of ) and (the principal part of ) on such that is free, is principal, , and does not mesh with . The principal part is the principal filter generated by the kernel of , and the free part consists of elements of with any number of elements from the kernel possibly removed.
A filter is countably deep if the kernel of any countable subset of belongs to .
Correspondence with order filters
The concept of a filter on a set is a special case of the more general concept of a filter on a partially ordered set. By definition, a filter on a partially ordered set is a subset of which is upwards-closed (if and then ) and downwards-directed (every finite subset of has a lower bound in ). A filter on a set is the same as a filter on the powerset ordered by inclusion.
Constructions of filters
Intersection of filters
If is a family of filters on , its intersection is a filter on . The intersection is a greatest lower bound operation in the set of filters on partially ordered by inclusion, which endows the filters on with a complete lattice structure.
The intersection consists of the subsets which can be written as where for each .
Filter generated by a family of subsets
Given a family of subsets , there exists a minimum filter on (in the sense of inclusion) which contains . It can be constructed as the intersection (greatest lower bound) of all filters on containing . This filter is called the filter generated by , and is said to be a filter subbase of .
The generated filter can also be described more explicitly: is obtained by closing under finite intersections, then upwards, i.e., consists of the subsets such that for some .
Since these operations preserve the kernel, it follows that is a proper filter if and only if has the finite intersection property: the intersection of a finite subfamily of is non-empty.
In the complete lattice of filters on ordered by inclusion, the least upper bound of a family of filters is the filter generated by .
Two filters and on mesh if and only if is proper.
Filter bases
Let be a filter on . A filter base of is a family of subsets such that is the upwards closure of , i.e., consists of those subsets for which for some .
This upwards closure is a filter if and only if is downwards-directed, i.e., is non-empty and for all there exists such that . When this is the case, is also called a prefilter, and the upwards closure is also equal to the generated filter . Hence, being a filter base of is a stronger property than being a filter subbase of .
Examples
When is a topological space and , a filter base of the neighborhood filter of is known as a neighborhood base for , and similarly, a filter subbase of the neighborhood filter of is known as a neighborhood subbase for . The open neighborhoods of always form a neighborhood base for , by definition of the neighborhood filter. In , the closed balls of positive radius around also form a neighborhood base for .
Let be an infinite set and let consist of the subsets of which contain all points but one. Then is a filter subbase of the Fréchet filter on , which consists of the cofinite subsets. Its closure under finite intersections is the entire Fréchet filter, but there are smaller bases of the Fréchet filter which contain the subbase , such as the one formed by the subsets of which contain all points but a finite odd number. In fact, for every base of the Fréchet filter, removing any subset yields another base of the Fréchet filter.
If is a topological space, the denseopen subsets of form a filter base on , because they are closed under finite intersection. The filter they generate consists of the complements of nowhere dense subsets. On , restricting to the null dense open subsets yields another filter base for the same filter.[citation needed]
Similarly, if is a topological space, the countable intersections of dense open subsets form a filter base which generates the filter of comeager subsets.
Let be a set and let be a net with values in , i.e., a family whose domain is a directed set. The filter base of tails of consists of the sets for ; it is downwards-closed by directedness of . The generated filter is called the eventuality filter or filter of tails of . A sequential filter or elementary filter[citation needed] is a filter which is the eventuality filter of some net. This example is fundamental in the application of filters in topology.
If is a filter on and , the trace of on is , which is a filter.
Image of a filter by a function
Let be a function.
When is a family of subsets of , its image by is defined as
The image filter by of a filter on is defined as the generated filter . If is surjective, then is already a filter. In the general case, is a filter base and hence is its upwards closure. Furthermore, if is a filter base of then is a filter base of .
The kernels of and are linked by .
Product of filters
Given a family of sets and a filter on each , the product filter on the product set is defined as the filter generated by the sets for and , where is the projection from the product set onto the -th component. This construction is similar to the product topology.
If each is a filter base on , a filter base of is given by the sets where is a family such that for all and for all but finitely many .
↑It is immediate that a filter on is an order filter on . For the converse, let be an order filter on . It is upwards-closed by definition. We check closure under finite intersections. If is a finite family of subsets from , it has a lower bound in by downwards-closure, which is some such that . Then , hence by upwards-closure.
Köthe, Gottfried (1983) [1969]. Topological Vector Spaces I. Grundlehren der mathematischen Wissenschaften. Vol.159. Translated by Garling, D. J. H. New York: Springer Science & Business Media. pp.11–15. ISBN978-3-642-64988-2. MR0248498. OCLC840293704.
Koutras, Costas D.; Moyzes, Christos; Nomikos, Christos; Tsaprounis, Konstantinos; Zikos, Yorgos (20 October 2021). "On Weak Filters and Ultrafilters: Set Theory From (and for) Knowledge Representation". Logic Journal of the IGPL. 31: 68–95. doi:10.1093/jigpal/jzab030.
MacIver R., David (1 July 2004). "Filters in Analysis and Topology"(PDF). Archived from the original(PDF) on 2007-10-09. (Provides an introductory review of filters in topology and in metric spaces.)
Narici, Lawrence; Beckenstein, Edward (2011). Topological Vector Spaces. Pure and applied mathematics (Seconded.). Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press. pp.2–5. ISBN978-1584888666. OCLC144216834.
Additionally, a semiring is a π-system where every complement is equal to a finite disjoint union of sets in
A semialgebra is a semiring where every complement is equal to a finite disjoint union of sets in are arbitrary elements of and it is assumed that