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Let $X$ be a separable normed space. Is it true that every subspace is separable? If it was Hilbert space I would take the dense set and then their projections. It sounds trivial but I cannot prove or disprove it...

Thank you.

t.b.
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clark
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    Hint: A metric space is separable if and only if it is second countable. Second countability passes to subspaces. – t.b. Aug 09 '12 at 15:09
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    I see so it is seperable because every open set of a subspace is of the form $Y \cap V$ where V is an open set of $X$ – clark Aug 09 '12 at 15:14
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    A metric space is separable IFF it doesn't contain uncountable family of points with pairwise distance greater than some $\delta$. Corollary - subspace of separable space is separable. – Norbert Aug 09 '12 at 15:51
  • My problem was how to pass from the topology of the subspace to the whole topology space – clark Aug 09 '12 at 15:53
  • Related: https://math.stackexchange.com/questions/1628253/subspace-of-a-separable-space-is-separable – Watson Jan 08 '17 at 16:49

1 Answers1

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Let $X$ be a separable metric space and $x_n$ a dense subset. Let $a_m$ be an enumeration of the positive rational numbers and let $V_{(n,m)}=\{y \in X \mid d(y,x_n) < a_m \}$. This is a countable base of X.

Indeed, take an open set $U$ of $X$. For $y_0 \in U$ there is $\epsilon >0$ such that $B(y_0, \epsilon) \subset U$. Choose $x_{n_0}$ such that $d(x_{n_0},y)< \frac{ \epsilon }{4}$ and $a_{m_0}$ such that $ \frac{ \epsilon }{4}< a_{m_0} < \frac{ \epsilon }{2} $.Then $y \in V_y=V_{ (n_0 , m_0)} \subset U$ and $$U= \bigcup_{y \in U}V_y.$$

t.b.
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clark
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    Exactly. Now intersect your base with the subspace, get again a base and pick a point in each one of the countably many basis sets. +1. (Btw: it's sepArable, not seperable) – t.b. Aug 09 '12 at 15:42
  • Yes yes, I understood from your comment if I proved that how it would go afterwards. Thanks! (P.S. I will not make that mistake again it always slipped my mind, it was because of my wrong accent ) – clark Aug 09 '12 at 15:49
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    Small nitpick: better take all rational radii (instead of only those of the form $1/m$) because there need not be a number of the form $1/m_0$ between $\epsilon/4$ and $\epsilon/2$. – t.b. Aug 09 '12 at 15:52