Alphabeta Math
TheoremStatement: Literature-sourcedProof: AI-adaptedprecheck passjudge pass (z-ai/glm-5.2)audited 2026-07-28
How statement and proof provenance work

The first chip identifies the source of the statement or construction; the second identifies the source of its local proof or verification.

  • Literature-sourced: the exact statement appears in a cited source; only wording and notation differ.
  • AI-adapted: a semantically identical restatement of literature-sourced material, modulo indexing, notation, and boundary cases adopted by the library.
  • AI-generated: a genuinely novel statement formulated by AI, with no source for the claim itself.

These labels describe origin, not correctness: citations and verification chips remain separate evidence.

Froda's theorem: the set of discontinuities of a monotone function on an interval is at most countable, the injection into N being built from one fixed enumeration of the rationals by least index, so no choice principle is used

Statement

Let I⊆R be order-convex (Intervals of R: the nine order-convex forms, nondegeneracy, and length) and let f:I→R be monotone (Nondecreasing, increasing (strictly increasing), nonincreasing, decreasing, monotone and strictly monotone real functions on a subset of R, with the dictionary to monotone sequences). Then the set

D  :=  { c∈I:f is discontinuous at c }

(Discontinuity of f at a point of its domain, and its classification: removable discontinuity, jump discontinuity and essential discontinuity, equivalently Rudin's discontinuities of the first and of the second kind) is at most countable (Finite, countably infinite, countable, uncountable).

More precisely, the proof exhibits an injection J:D→N (Injection, surjection, bijection) built from one fixed enumeration of the rationals: at a discontinuity c interior to I the value J(c) is read off the least index of a rational lying in the gap (lim⁡x→c−f(x), lim⁡x→c+f(x)), which is a nonempty open interval by A monotone function on an interval has no discontinuity of the second kind: at every point both relevant one-sided limits exist, and an interior point c is a discontinuity exactly when lim⁡x→c−f(x)<lim⁡x→c+f(x). The map J is therefore determined by f and by the fixed enumeration, and no choice principle is used: least indices are canonical by The well-ordering principle, and nothing anywhere in the proof is selected without being determined.

Facts & Assumptions

Given: An order-convex I⊆R and a monotone f:I→R; and Q denotes the canonical copy of the rationals inside R.

[A1]

I is order-convex: x,y∈I and x≤z≤y imply z∈I (Intervals of R: the nine order-convex forms, nondegeneracy, and length).

[L1]

A nondecreasing f on an order-convex I has, at every c∈I, each well-posed one-sided limit; and if both I−=I∩(−∞,c) and I+=I∩(c,∞) are nonempty then lim⁡x→c−f(x)=sup⁡{f(x):x∈I,x<c} and lim⁡x→c+f(x)=inf⁡{f(x):x∈I,x>c} (One-sided limits of a monotone function always exist: for f nondecreasing on an interval I and c∈I, lim⁡x→c−f(x)=sup⁡{f(x):x∈I, x<c} whenever I has points below c, lim⁡x→c+f(x)=inf⁡{f(x):x∈I, x>c} whenever it has points above c, and these satisfy lim⁡x→c−f(x)≤f(c)≤lim⁡x→c+f(x)).

[L2]

For a nondecreasing f on an order-convex I and a point c with both I− and I+ nonempty, f is discontinuous at c if and only if lim⁡x→c−f(x)<lim⁡x→c+f(x) (A monotone function on an interval has no discontinuity of the second kind: at every point both relevant one-sided limits exist, and an interior point c is a discontinuity exactly when lim⁡x→c−f(x)<lim⁡x→c+f(x)).

[L3]

Q≈N (Q is countably infinite) and the map q↦q^ embeds Q in R injectively (The rationals embed densely in the reals), so composing a bijection N→Q with that embedding gives a bijection e:N→QR onto the canonical copy of the rationals inside R; and strictly between any two distinct reals there lies a point of QR (The rationals embed densely in the reals, Equinumerous sets, A≈B and A⪯B, Injection, surjection, bijection).

[L4]

Every nonempty subset of N has a least element (The well-ordering principle).

[L5]

Proof

technique · direct
1.1

It is enough to treat a nondecreasing f: if f is nonincreasing then −f is nondecreasing and has the same discontinuity set, so the conclusion for −f is the conclusion for f. Assume from here on that f is nondecreasing.

L6
1.2

Fix once and for all a bijection e:N→QR; everything below is defined in terms of f, I and this one function.

L3choose
1.3

Call c∈I interior when both I− and I+ are nonempty, and write D0 for the set of interior points of I at which f is discontinuous. A point of I that is not interior has I−=∅, and is then a least element of I, or I+=∅, and is then a greatest element of I; a subset of R has at most one least and at most one greatest element, so D∖D0 has at most two elements.

A1
2.1

For c∈D0 put L−(c):=lim⁡x→c−f(x) and L+(c):=lim⁡x→c+f(x), both of which exist, and note L−(c)<L+(c).

step 1.3L1L2
2.2

Let c,c′∈D0 with c<c′. Take t:=e(k) for the least k with c<e(k)<c′, which exists because a point of QR lies strictly between c and c′; then t∈I, since c,c′∈I and I is order-convex.

step 1.3A1L3L4
3.1

For c∈D0 the set K(c):={ k∈N:L−(c)<e(k)<L+(c) } is nonempty, since a point of QR lies strictly between the two distinct reals L−(c) and L+(c) and e is onto QR; so j(c):=min⁡K(c) is a well-defined natural number, determined by c, f and e alone.

step 2.1L3L4
3.2

With c<t<c′ as in step 2.2: L+(c)=inf⁡{f(x):x∈I,x>c}≤f(t) because t is one of the points in that set, and f(t)≤sup⁡{f(x):x∈I,x<c′}=L−(c′) for the same reason on the other side. Hence L+(c)≤L−(c′).

step 2.2L1
4.1

The two open intervals (L−(c),L+(c)) and (L−(c′),L+(c′)) are therefore disjoint, so no point of QR lies in both, so e(j(c))≠e(j(c′)) and hence j(c)≠j(c′). Since c<c′ was an arbitrary pair of distinct elements of D0, the map j:D0→N is injective.

step 3.1step 3.2
5.1

Define J:D→N by J(c):=2 j(c)+1 for c∈D0; J(c):=0 if c∈D∖D0 is a least element of I; and J(c):=2 if c∈D∖D0 is a greatest element of I and not a least one. Then J is injective: it is injective on D0 by step 4.1, it separates the at most two points of D∖D0 from each other, and its values on D0 are odd while its values off D0 are even.

step 1.3step 4.1construct
6.1

Consequently J is a bijection from D onto the subset J[D]⊆N, which is at most countable; countability transfers along that bijection, so D is at most countable.

step 5.1L5∎

Remarks

Depends on

Used by

Dependency tree · two levels

65 results within two dependency steps of this one, each drawn at its shortest distance from it. An arrow runs from a result to what uses it, so the chart reads left to right and ends at this result, which carries a heavier outline. Every node is a link to that result. Click elsewhere on the chart to enlarge it.

Sources