Abstract

A set is a well defined collection of objects called the elements or numbers of the set. A
specific set can be defined in two ways: If there are only a few elements they can be listed
individually by writing them between curly brackets {} and placing commas in between. The
second way of writing set is to use a property that defines elements of the set. A set is well
defined if we can tell whether a particular object is an element of that set. Each element of the
set is written only once and the order of elements is not important in set. In order to get a brief
knowledge about set, it is divided into various types like empty set, subset, singleton set, and
so on.

George cantor was born on March 3, 1845 in St. Petersburg, Russia and
died on January 6, 1918 in Halle, Germany. He was the first mathematician who defined the
basic ideas of set theory. Using ingenious methods, he proved remarkable things about
infinite sets.
 Contents:

 Introduction

 Objective

 Methodology

 Methods of describing set

 Types of set
 Introduction

A set is a well-defined collection of distinct objects. The objects that make up a set (also
known as the set's elements or members can be anything: numbers, people, letters of the
alphabet, other sets, and so on. Georg Cantor, one of the founders of set theory, gave the
following definition of a set at the beginning of his Beiträge zur Begründung der transfiniten
Mengenlehre

A set is a gathering together into a whole of definite, distinct objects of our perception or of
our thought—which are called elements of the set.

In mathematics, a set is a collection of distinct objects, considered as

an object in its own right. For example, the numbers 2, 4, and 6 are distinct objects when
considered separately, but when they are considered collectively they form a single set of size
three, written {2,4,6}. The concept of a set is one of the most fundamental in mathematics.
Developed at the end of the 19th century, set theory is now a ubiquitous part of mathematics,
and can be used as a foundation from which nearly all of mathematics can be derived.

Sets are conventionally denoted with capital letters. Sets A and B are equal if and only if they
have precisely the same elements.[2]

For technical reasons, Cantor's definition turned out to be inadequate; today, in contexts
where more rigor is required, one can use axiomatic set theory, in which the notion of a "set"
is taken as a primitive notion and the properties of sets are defined by a collection of axioms.
The most basic properties are that a set can have elements, and that two sets are equal (one
and the same) if and only if every element of each set is an element of the other; this property
is called the extensionality of sets

Objective: To know various types of sets

Methodology: Books

Websites
 Methods of describing set:

Roster method:
In roster form, all the elements of a set are listed, the elements are being
separated by commas and are enclosed within braces { }. For example, the set of all even
positive integers less than 7 is described in roster form as {2, 4, 6}. Some more examples of
representing a set in roster form are given below :
(a) The set of all natural numbers which divide 42 is {1, 2, 3, 6, 7, 14, 21, 42}.
In roster form, the order in which the elements are listed is immaterial. Thus, the above set
can also be represented as {1, 3, 7, 21, 2, 6, 14, 42}

(b) The set of all vowels in the English alphabet is {a, e, i, o, u}.
(c) The set of odd natural numbers is represented by {1, 3, 5, . . .}. The dots tell us that the list
of odd numbers continue indefinitely.

It may be noted that while writing the set in roster form an element is not generally repeated,
i.e., all the elements are taken as distinct. For example, the set of letters forming the word
„SCHOOL‟ is { S, C, H, O, L} or {H, O, L, C, S}. Here, the order of listing elements has no
relevance.

Set builder method:

In set-builder form, all the elements of a set possess a single common

property which is not possessed by any element outside the set. For example, in the set {a, e,
i, o, u}, all the elements possess a common property, namely, each of them is a vowel in the
English alphabet, and no other letter possess this property. Denoting this set by V, we write
V = {x : x is a vowel in English alphabet}

It may be observed that we describe the element of the set by using a symbol x (any other
symbol like the letters y, z, etc. could be used) which is followed by a colon “ : ”. After the
sign of colon, we write the characteristic property possessed by the elements of the set and
then enclose the whole description within braces. The above description of the set V is read as
“the set of all x such that x is a vowel of the English alphabet”. In this description the braces
stand for “the set of all”, the colon stands for “such that”. For example, the set
 Types of sets:

 Empty Set: The set which is empty! This means that there are no elements in the set.
This set is represented by ϕ or {}. An empty set is hence defined as:

Definition: If a set doesn‟t have any elements, it is known as an empty set or null set or void
set. For e.g. consider the set

P = {x : x is a leap year between 1904 and 1908}

Between 1904 and 1908, there is no leap year. So, P = ϕ. Similarly, the set

Q = {y : y is a whole number which is not a natural number,y ≠ 0}

0 is the only whole number that is not a natural number. If y ≠ 0, then there is no other value
possible for y. Hence, Q = ϕ.

 Singleton Set: If a set contains only one element, then it is called a singleton set. For
e.g.

A = {x : x is an even prime number}

B={ y : y is a whole number which is not a natural number}

 Multi- ton set: A set which contains more than one element is called a multi- ton set.
For example: A= {3,8}

 Finite Set: In this set, the number of elements is finite. All the empty sets also fall
into the category of finite sets.

Definition: If a set contains no element or a definite number of elements, it is called finite set.

If the set is non-empty, it is called a non-empty finite set. Some examples of finite sets are:
A = {x : x is a month in an year}; A will have 12 elements

B={y: y is the zero of a polynomial (x4 − 6x2 + x + 2)}; B will have 4 zeroes
  Infinite Set: Just contrary to the finite set, it will have infinite elements. If a given set
is not finite, then it will be an infinite set.

For e.g.
A = {x : x is a natural number}; There are infinite natural numbers. Hence, A is an infinite
set.

B = {y: y is ordinate of a point on a given line}; There are infinite points on a line. So, B is an
infinite set.

 Power Set: An understanding of what subsets are is required before going ahead with
Power-set.

Definition: The power set of a set A is the set which consists of all the subsets of the set A. It
is denoted by P(A).

For a set A which consists of n elements, the total number of subsets that can be formed is 2n.
From this, we can say that P(A) will have 2n elements. For e.g.

 Sub Set:

A={-9,13,6}

Subsets of A= ϕ,{-9},{13},{6},{-9,13},{13,6},{6,-9},{-9,13,6}

Definition: If a set A contains elements which are all the elements of set B as well, then A is
known as the subset of B.

P(A)={ϕ,{-9},{13},{6},{-9,13},{13,6},{6,-9},{-9,13,6}}

 Universal Set: This is the set which is the base for every other set formed.
Depending upon the context, the universal set is decided. It may be a finite or infinite
set. All the other sets are the subsets of the Universal set. It is represented by U.

For e.g. The set of real numbers is a universal set of integers. Similarly, the set of complex
number is the universal set for real numbers.

 Cardinal number of a finite set: The number of distinct elements presented in a

finite set is known as cardinal number. It is denoted by n(A) .
For example: A= {2, 3, 4, 5} n(A)= 4
 Equal set: Two finite sets are said to be equal if their cardinal number are same along
with the elements.
For example: A= {2, 3, 5, 8} and B= {2, 3, 5, 8}
Here set A and set B are equal.
 Equivalent sets: Two finite sets A and B are said to be equivalent if their cardinal
numbers are same.
For example: A {1, 3, 5, 7} and B= {2, 4, 6 , 7}
Here n(A)= 4 and n(B)=4

 Overlapping set: Two finite sets A and B are said to be overlapping if there is at least
1 element common to both A and B.
For example: A= {1, 2, 3, 4} and B={ 4, 5, 6, 7}

 Non overlapping set: Two finite sets A and B are said to be non overlapping if there
is no elements common to both.
For example: A={1, 3, 5, 8} and B={2, 4, 6, 8}
 Conclusion:

As we know that set is the brief summery of elements used in a particular head we can learn
in short the nature and the number of elements from it. Actually, describing sets is just a
matter of making more or less formal description of what is included and what is not
included. People use sets when they are making rules or defining corrective action. Experts
also use the application of set theory to economic analysis. There is a use of sets in
programming. Mathematicians are mostly benefited by sets as many mathematical concepts
can be distinct accurately using set theoretic concepts.
 References:

 slideshare.com

 Business mathematics and statistics by Digambar pati and D. N patri

 Quora .com

 Wikipedia.com

Thank you