MATH255: Mathematics for Computing

Dr Chayne Planiden

School of Mathematics and Statistics

University of Wollongong

January 17, 2024

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Week 4: Relations and Functions

Definition
A pair (a, b) is an ordered pair if it has the property

(a, b) = (c, d) ⇔ a = c ∧ b = d.

Definition
The Cartesian product A × B is the set of all ordered pairs
with first element from A and second element from B.

A × B = {(a, b) : a ∈ A, b ∈ B}

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Relations

Example. Let A = B = R. Then A × B = R × R = R2 is the set

of all points in the Cartesian plane.
Example. Let A = {3}, B = {2, 3}. Then A × B = {(3, 2), (3, 3)}.
Example. Let A = {x, y }, B = {1, 2, 3}, C = {α, β}. Then
A × B = {(x, 1), (x, 2), (x, 3), (y , 1), (y , 2), (y , 3)} and
(A×B)×C = {((x, 1, α), (x, 2, α), (x, 3, α), (y , 1, α), (y , 2, α), (y , 3, α),
(x, 1, β), (x, 2, β), (x, 3, β), (y , 1, β), (y , 2, β), (y , 3, β)}.

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Relations

Definition
A relation R from A to B is a subset of A × B that is defined by
some rule that relates elements of A with elements of B. We
say that a is related to b, denoted by aRb, if (a, b) ∈ R.

Example. Let S = {0, 1, 2, 3}, R ⊆ S × S:

R = {(x, y ) : ∃ z ∈ N s.t. x + z = y }.
(a) What is a simpler description of R?
(b) List all the elements of R.
(c) Sketch S × S and circle the members of R.

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Relations
(a) Since x, y ∈ S and x + z = y for some z ∈ N, R is all pairs
(x, y ) such that x < y .

R = {(x, y ) : x < y }

(b) R = {(0, 1), (0, 2), (0, 3), (1, 2), (1, 3), (2, 3)}
(c) .

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Relations

Example. On Z \{0}, R = {(x, y ) : ∃ z ∈ Z s.t. xz = y }

(a) Describe R. (What if x = ±1, x = ±2, . . .)
(b) True or false: (2, −4) ∈ R, −3R0, (3, 5) ∈ R.
(a) If x = 1, then 1 · z = y , so (1, ±1), (1, ±2), · · · ∈ R.
If x = −1, then −1 · z = y , so (−1, ±1), (−1, ±2), · · · ∈ R.
If x = 2, then 2 · z = y , so (2, ±2), (2, ±4), · · · ∈ R.
This pattern continues with all choices of x, so
R = {(x, y ) : y is a nonzero multiple of x}.
(b) Since −4 is a nonzero multiple of 2, we have (2, −4) ∈ R.
Since 0 is not a nonzero multiple of −3, we have
(−3, 0) 6∈ R.
Since 5 is not a nonzero multiple of 3, we have (3, 5) 6∈ R.

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Relations

Example. On Z, R = {(m, n) : m − n is even}.

(a) Which are in R? (0, 3), (−5, −6), (2, −11), (17, 1)
(b) Prove that n odd → nR1.
(a) 0 − 3 = −3 → (0, 3) 6∈ R
−5 − (−6) = 1 → (−5, −6) 6∈ R
2 − (−11) = 13 → (2, −11) 6∈ R
17 − 1 = 16 → (17, 1) ∈ R
(b) Let n be odd. Then ∃ k ∈ Z s.t. n = 2k + 1. Is nR1?
n − 1 = (2k + 1) − 1 = 2k , k ∈ Z → nR1.

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Relations

Relations are sets, so all the set operators seen so far can be
applied to relations.
Example. On R, R1 = {(x, y ) : x = y }, R2 = {(x, y ) : x = −y }.
What are R1 ∪ R2 and R1 ∩ R2 ?
R1 ∪ R2 = {(x, y ) : x = ±y }, R2 = {(0, 0)}.

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Relations

Definition
Let R be a relation from A to B. The domain and range of R
are the following.

dom R = {x ∈ A : ∃ y ∈ B s.t. xRy }

ran R = {y ∈ B : ∃ x ∈ A s.t. xRy }

Note. dom R ⊆ A and ran R ⊆ B.

Example. Let A = {0, 1, 2, 3}, R = {(0, 0), (0, 1), (0, 2), (3, 0)}.
Find dom R, ran R.
dom R = {0, 3}, ran R = {0, 1, 2}

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Relations

Example. On Z, let R = {(x, y ) : xy 6= 0}. Find dom R, ran R.

dom R = Z \{0}, ran R = Z \{0}
Example. On Z × Q, let R = (x, y ) : x 6= 0 ∧ y = x1 . Find


dom R, ran R.
R = (1, 1), 2, 12 , 3, 31 , . . . , (−1, −1), −2, − 21 , −3, − 13 , . . .


dom R = Z \{0}, ran R = ±1, ± 12 , ± 13 , . . .



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Relations

Definition
Let R be a relation from A to B. The inverse relation R −1 from
B to A is define

R −1 = {(y , x) : (x, y ) ∈ R}.

Note. dom R −1 = ran R, ran R −1 = dom R.

Example. Let A = {a, b, c}, B = {1, 2, 3, 4},
R = {(a, 1), (b, 2), (c, 3), (a, 4)}. Find R −1 .
R −1 = {(1, a), (2, b), (3, c), (4, a)}

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Relations

Example. On N, let R = {(x, y ) : y = 2x}. Write 3 elements of

R and 3 elements of R −1 . Define R −1 .
(1, 2), (5, 10), (36, 72) ∈ R
(2, 1), (10, 5), (72, 36) ∈ R −1
R −1 = {(x, y ) : x = 2y }

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Relations

Definition
Let R be a relation on A. Then R is
1 reflexive if ∀ x ∈ A, xRx;
2 symmetric if ∀ x, y ∈ A, xRy → yRx;
3 transitive if ∀ x, y , z ∈ A, xRy ∧ yRz → xRz.

Example. On N, R = {(x, y ) : x is a factor of y } (y = kx, k ∈ N).

∀ x ∈ N, xRx? x = 1 · x, 1 ∈ N TRUE. Thus, R is reflexive.
∀ x, y ∈ N, xRy → yRx?
1
2R6 since 6 = 3 · 2, but 2 = 6k → k = 3 6∈ N, so (6, 2) 6∈ R.
Thus, R is not symmetric.
∀ x, y , z ∈ N, xRy ∧ yRz → xRz?
xRy ∧ yRz → y = kx, z = py , k , p ∈ N.
z = py = p(kx) = (pk )x, pk ∈ N → xRz. Thus, R is transitive.

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Relations

Example. On R, R = {(x, x) : x ∈ R} is the identity relation.

Since (x, x) ∈ R ∀ x ∈ R, we have that R is reflexive.
Since (x, y ) ∈ R → x = y → (y , x) ∈ R, we have that R is
symmetric.
Since (x, y ), (y , z) ∈ R → x = y = z → (x, z) ∈ R, we have that
R is transitive.

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Relations

Example. On Z, R = {(x, y ) : x < y }.

Since x 6< x for any x ∈ Z, we have that (x, x) 6∈ R ∀ x ∈ Z and
R is not reflexive.
For instance 3 < 5 so (3, 5) ∈ R, but 5 6< 3 so (5, 3) 6∈ R and R
is not symmetric.
If x < y and y < z, then for sure x < z. So (x, y ), (y , z) ∈ R →
(x, z) ∈ R ∀ x, y , z ∈ Z and R is transitive.

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Relations

Example. On the set P of people in the world, R = {(x, y ) :

x is in the family of y }.
∀ x ∈ P, x is in the family of x. So R is reflexive.
∀ x, y ∈ P, i x is in the family of y , then y is in the family of x. So
R is symmetric.
∀ x, y , z ∈ P, if x is in the family of y and y is in the family of z,
then x is in the family of z. So R is transitive.

Exercise. Determine reflexive, symmetric, transitive for the fol-

lowing relations.
1 On R, R = {(x, y ) : y = x 2 }.
2 On P, R = {(x, y ) : x loves y }.

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Relations
Definition
Let R be a relation on A. Then R is an equivalence relation on
A iff R is reflexive, symmetric and transitive.

Example. On Z , prove that R = {(a, b) : ab = 0} is not an

equivalence relation.
This is a symmetric relation, since ab = 0 → ba = 0. But it is
not reflexive nor transitive. One counterexample is enough, bet
here is one for each.
If (1, 1) ∈ R, then 1 · 1 = 0 FALSE. Thus, (1, 1) 6∈ R and R is not
reflexive. Therefore, R is not an equivalence relation.
(1, 0) ∈ R and (0, 3) ∈ R, but (1, 3) 6∈ R, so R is not transitive.
Therefore, R is not an equivalence relation.
Exercise. Prove that for any given n ∈ Z, R = {(a, b) : (b −
a)/n ∈ Z} is an equivalence relation on Z.
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Relations

Example. Let A = {0, 1, 2, 3}, R = {(0, 0), (0, 2), (1, 1), (2, 0), (2, 2), (3, 3)}.
Prove R is an equivalence relation.
Since (0, 0), (1, 1), (2, 2), (3, 3) ∈ R, we have that R is reflexive.
(0, 2) ∈ R → (2, 0) ∈ R and vice versa, and trivially (0, 0) ∈
R → (0, 0) ∈ R, etc., so we have that R is symmetric.
(0, 0), (0, 2) ∈ R → (0, 2) ∈ R; (1, 1), (1, 1) ∈ R → (1, 1) ∈ R
(2, 0), (0, 0) ∈ R → (2, 0) ∈ R; (2, 0), (0, 2) ∈ R → (2, 2) ∈ R
(2, 2), (2, 0) ∈ R → (2, 0) ∈ R; (2, 2), (2, 2) ∈ R → (2, 2) ∈ R
(3, 3), (3, 3) ∈ R → (3, 3) ∈ R; (0, 0), (0, 0) ∈ R → (0, 0) ∈ R
So we have that R is transitive.

Therefore, R is an equivalence relation.

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Relations

Definition
Let R be an equivalence relation on A. For each a ∈ A, the
equivalence class of a, denoted by [a], is the set of all
elements of A that are related to a.

[a] = {x ∈ A : xRa}

For any a, b ∈ A, either [a] = [b] or [a] ∩ [b] = ∅.

All equivalence classes of A form a partition of A: their
union is A and their pairwise intersection is empty.

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Relations

Example. Let A = {0, 1, 2}, R = {(0, 0), (1, 1), (2, 2), (0, 1), (1, 0)}.
Find [0], [1], [2].
[0] = {x ∈ A : xR0} = {0, 1}
[1] = {x ∈ A : xR1} = {0, 1}
[2] = {x ∈ A : xR2} = {2}
Example. What do the equivalence classes of the identity rela-
tion on R look like? R = {(x, x) : x ∈ R}
1  1
1
2 = x ∈ R : xR 2 = 2
[0] = {0}
[−2.4] = {−2.4} . . .

Every equivalence class is just one element.

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Relations

Example. On Z, let R = {(a, b) : a ≡ b (mod 3)}. Find [0], [1], [2].

[0] = {x ∈ Z : xR0} = x ∈ Z : 0−x

3 ∈ Z = {. . . , −6, −3, 0, 3, 6, . . .}
[1] = x ∈ Z : 1−x

3 ∈ Z = {. . . , −5, −2, 1, 4, 7, . . .}
2−x

[2] = x ∈ Z : 3 ∈ Z = {. . . , −4, −1, 2, 5, 8, . . .}

Note. [0] = [3] = [−3] = [6] = · · · , etc.,

[0] ∩ [1] = ∅, [0] ∩ [2] = ∅, [1] ∩ [2] = ∅ and
[0] ∪ [1] ∪ [2] = Z.

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Functions

Definition
A relation f from A to B is a function iff for each x ∈ A there is
at most one y ∈ B such that (x, y ) ∈ f .

A function f from A to B is denoted by f : A → B. The equation

y = f (x) means that (x, y ) ∈ f , in which case y is the image of
x under f .

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Functions
Relations on R can be plotted by drawing all the points. A graph-
ical way to see if a relation is a function or not is the vertical line
test: every vertical line cuts through the curve of the relation at
most once. This is not a proof, but it is a good way to visualise
functions.

The relation on the left is a function, as every possible vertical

line intersects the curve only once. The relation on the right is
not a function; while there are some vertical lines that intersect
at most once, there are others that intersect twice.

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Functions

Exercise. Sketch the relations below and convince yourself which

ones are functions via the vertical line test.
1 On R, R = {(x, y ) : y = x 2 }
2 On R, R = {(x, y ) : x = y 2 }
3 On R+ , R = {(x, y ) : x = y 2 }
√
4 On R, R = {(x, y ) : y = x}
Exercise. Which are functions?
1 The identity relation on A = {1, 5, 10}
2 A = {0, 2, 4}, B = {1, 3, 5}, R on A × B,
R = {(x, y ) : x + 1 = y }
3 On Z, F = {(x, y ) : x + 1 = y }
4 On R, R = {(x, y ) : y = 1}

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Functions

Definition
Let f : A → B be a function. Then f is injective (one-to-one) iff
for all x1 , x2 ∈ A,

f (x1 ) = f (x2 ) ⇔ x1 = x2 .

That is, each element of the range is the image of only one
element of the domain.
Note. An injective function satisfies the horizontal line test.

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Functions

Example. Let A = {0, 1, 2, 3}, f : P(A) → N ∪{0}, f (Ai ) = |Ai |,

so f outputs the number of elements in Ai . Prove or disprove
that f is injective.

f ({1, 2}) = 2
f ({1, 3}) = 2

So this is not a 1 − 1 function; f is not injective.

Example. Which are injective?
On A = {1, 2, 3}, F = {(1, 2), (2, 3), (3, 1)}.
On A, G = {(1, 2), (2, 1), (3, 1)}.
On Z, F = {(x, y ) : y = 2x}.
√
On Z \{0} × R, F = {(x, y ) : y x 2 − 1}.

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Functions
1 By direct inspection, every output comes from one distinct
input. Therefore, F is injective.
2 By direct inspection, the 1 is an output for two different
inputs: the 2 and the 3. Therefore, G is not injective.
3 Let F (x1 ) = F (x2 ). Then
2x1 2x2
2x1 = 2x2 → = → x1 = x2 .
2 2
Therefore, F is 1-1.
4 Let F (x1 ) = F (x2 ). Then
q q q 2 q 2
x1 − 1 = x2 − 1 → x1 − 1 = x22 − 1
2 2 2

→ x12 − 1 = x22 − 1 → x12 = x22 → x1 = ±x2

For instance, F (1) = 0 and F (−1) = 0. Therefore, F is not

1-1.
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Functions

Definition
A function f : A → B is surjective (onto) iff ran f = B. That is,

∀ y ∈ B ∃ x ∈ A s.t. f (x) = y .

Example. Let A = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5}, B = {a, b, c, d}. Which are

surjective?
1 f : A → B, f = {(1, a), (2, c), (3, c), (4, d), (5, d)}
2 f : A → B, f = {(1, a), (2, b), (3, c), (4, d), (5, a)}
3 f : R → R, f (x) = 4x − 1
4 f : Z → Z, f (x) = 4x − 1

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Functions

1 Since b ∈ B & there is no x ∈ A s.t. f (x) = b, f is not onto.

2 Since every y ∈ B is output for at least one x ∈ A, f is onto.
3 Let y ∈ R. Is there x ∈ R s.t. f (x) = y ?

y +1
y = 4x − 1 → x = ∈R YES
4
Therefore, f is surjective.
4 For instance, let y = 2. Then

2+1 3
2 = 4x − 1 → x = = 6∈ Z .
4 4
Therefore, f is not surjective.

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Functions

Definition
The inverse of a function f , denoted by f −1 , is also a function iff
f is bijective, i.e. injective and surjective.

In the case that f −1 is a function, the following properties are

satisfied.
dom f −1 = ran f
ran f −1 = dom f
f (f −1 (x)) = x ∀ x ∈ ran f
f −1 (f (x)) = x ∀ x ∈ dom f

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Functions
Graphically, f −1 is the reflection of f about the line y = x.
Example. Sketch f : R+ → R+ , f (x) = x 2 . Find and sketch f −1 .
Is f −1 a function?

The red curve is y = x 2 .√Reflecting on y = x (black dashed), we

obtain the function y = x in blue, the inverse function of x 2 .

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Functions

Example. Find and test the inverse function of f : R → R, f (x) =

3x − 2.
1
f −1 : x = 3y − 2 → x + 2 = 3y → y = (x + 2)
   3
1 1
f (f −1 (x)) = f (x + 2) = 3 (x + 2) − 2 = x + 2 − 2 = x
3 3
1 1
f −1 (f (x)) = f −1 (3x − 2) = [(3x − 2) + 2] = · 3x = x
3 3

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Functions

x−2
Example. Let f : R → R, f (x) = x+1 . Find the domain and range
of f , prove f is bijective and find f −1 .
The domain is the set of all allowable inputs, so only the −1
causes a problem (division by zero): dom f = R \{−1}. The
range of f is the domain of f −1 , so let’s wait on that.
Injective. Let f (x1 ) = f (x2 ). Then

x1 − 2 x2 − 2
= ⇔ (x1 − 2)(x2 + 1) = (x1 + 1)(x2 − 2)
x1 + 1 x2 + 1
⇔x1 x2 − 2x2 + x1 − 2 = x1 x2 + x2 − 2x1 − 2
⇔ − 2x2 + x1 = x2 − 2x1 ⇔ 3x1 = 3x2 ⇔ x1 = x2

Therefore, f is injective.

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Functions

Surjective. Let y ∈ R. If ∃ x ∈ R s.t. f (x) = y , then

x −2
y= ⇔ y (x + 1) = x − 2 ⇔ xy + y = x − 2
x +1
2+y
⇔x(1 − y ) = 2 + y ⇔ x = ∈ R,
1−y

as long as y 6= 1. Therefore, f is surjective. Also, this gives

f −1 (x) = 2+x
1−x and thus ran f = dom f
−1 = R \{1}.

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