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The normal way I use to prove that $\Bbb{R}$ and $\Bbb{R}^2$ are not homeomorphic is by removing a point and then using path connectedness. But this method doesn't seem to work for $\Bbb{R}^m$ and $\Bbb{R}^n$ and it ends up that its better if you use fundamental groups.

But what if I remove a line instead of a point from both the topological spaces. Does the argument still fail or will it lead to a proof?

  • it fails. The intuition about it is that in dimension higher than $1$ you can always go around a hole in a path connected way. This is why you need shrink continuously your path around the hole and this leads to compare simple connectedness (i.e fundamental groups and homotopy) – marwalix Jun 16 '15 at 16:14
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    If you want to use only connectivity argument, then you might be fail because proving connectivity of $\mathbb{R}^3 - f(\mathbb{R})$ is not as easy as connectivity of $\mathbb{R}^2-pt$. – cjackal Jun 16 '15 at 16:15
  • I want to see for a line which might be a little wacky @cjackal –  Jun 16 '15 at 16:16
  • Your dot over the "i" in homeomorphic was upside-down and I corrected it. Or to be a bit more precise, I actually changed $\Bbb{R^m}$ and $\Bbb{R^n}$ to $\Bbb{R}^m$ and $\Bbb{R}^n$, which is correct usage. ${}\qquad{}$ – Michael Hardy Jun 16 '15 at 17:15

3 Answers3

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If $m<n$, then we can make $\mathbb{R}^m$ disconnected by deleting an $(m-1)$-dimensional subset; more snappily, a codimension 1 subset. Now, in order to show that $\mathbb{R}^n\not\cong\mathbb{R}^m$, it will suffice to show that, if we delete the homeomorphic image of $\mathbb{R}^{m-1}$ from $\mathbb{R}^n$, the latter remains connected.

This is where things get tricky. For $m=1$ this is easy, since the homeomorphic image of a point is . . . well, a point. :P But the possible homeomorphic images of even a line in $\mathbb{R}^n$ are suddenly extremely complicated! I suspect that patching this argument will require using fundamental groups.


EDIT: In the comments, the OP writes: "I want to see for a line which might be a little wacky." Well, first of all, the point is not that there are (homeomorphic images of) lines (in $\mathbb{R}^n$) which are wacky, but rather that it would take proof to show there aren't any. As evidence that you should not take this for granted:


FURTHER EDIT: On the other hand, this doesn't rule out the possibility of arguments avoiding algebraic topology. For a really neat example, check out http://arxiv.org/pdf/1003.1467v2.pdf, which uses set theory of all things to show $\mathbb{R}^2\not\cong\mathbb{R}^n$ for any $n>2$. As far as I can tell, however, their method does not generalize beyond 2.

And see also Elementary proof that $\mathbb{R}^n$ is not homeomorphic to $\mathbb{R}^m$.

Noah Schweber
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  • You can instead of looking at connectedness, for $R^2$ vs $R^3$, remove a point and look at fundamental groups. But for higher dimensions, the fundamental group won't help much. What might help is something like Alexander Duality: the $n-1$th homology of $R^n - {pt}$ will be $\mathbb Z$, but that won't be true for the $n-1$th homology of $R^m - { pt }$, for $m > n$. – John Hughes Jun 16 '15 at 16:19
  • @JohnHughes $R^n-{pt}$ explicitly deformation retracts to $S^{n-1}$. Alexander duality is way over kill. – PVAL-inactive Jun 16 '15 at 16:21
  • @JohnHughes I want to use normal general topology for the proof which doesn't use either homology or algebraic topology –  Jun 16 '15 at 16:25
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    @PVAL: completely right. As for "I want to use general topology," I share your desire...but algebraic topology was invented in part precisely to address questions like these. :) – John Hughes Jun 16 '15 at 16:30
  • By the way, the arxiv paper mentioned is so interesting, as the authors said :) I haven't seen similar idea before. – cjackal Jun 16 '15 at 16:46
  • If you want to use general topology, you could just develop dimension theory, which is morally what we're doing in the algebraic setting anyway: building a notion of dimension. –  Jun 16 '15 at 17:04
  • See the last sentence of my answer. – Noah Schweber Jun 16 '15 at 17:17
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Essentially, yes, but it is quite hard to prove that removing a subspace homeomorphic with $\mathbb{R}$ (your "line") cannot disconnect $\mathbb{R}^3$. The Jordan curve theorem states that any continuous embedding of a circle in the plane disconnects it and that implies that $\mathbb{R}^2$ and $\mathbb{R}^3$ are not homeomorphic via an argument along the lines of the one you have in mind. Brouwer's theorem on the invariance of domain generalises this and implies that $\mathbb{R}^m$ and $\mathbb{R}^n$ are homeomorphic iff $m = n$. Both the Jordan curve theorem and invariance of domain are usually proved using homology theory.

Rob Arthan
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The tricky and counterintuitive fact is that there is a surjective continuous map $g:\mathbb{R}\rightarrow \mathbb{R}^2$(called space-filling curve).

So, by producting with $id:\mathbb{R}\rightarrow \mathbb{R}$, you have a surjective continuous map $f:\mathbb{R}^2 \rightarrow \mathbb{R}^3$ which maps $\mathbb{R}\times \left\{0\right\}$ to $\mathbb{R}^2 \times \left\{0\right\}$.

So, in this case, connectedness argument fails.

(Because there is no homeomorphism between $\mathbb{R}^2 $and $\mathbb{R}^3$, such argument does not cause contradiction, but at least this shows that using connectedness is not a smartest way to show the two space are not homeomorphic)

cjackal
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    To be fair, since that map isn't injective, this doesn't show the argument fails, it just shows it won't be easy . . . – Noah Schweber Jun 16 '15 at 16:22