THE LANGUANGE OF SETS

EXERCISE:
Group the following objects from the box according to their kinds. Write the set in both
Roster Method and in Rule Method.

Shoes Pentagon Swimming Oppo

iPhone Basketball Soccer Square
Sandals Circle Samsung Chess
Volleyball Hexagon Slippers Vivo

B. Translate the following set from Roster Method to Rule Method or vice versa.
a. K = {20, 25, 30, 35, 40}
b. S = {square, parallelogram, trapezoid, rhombus, diamond, rectangle}
c. N = {I, II, IV, V, IX, XV, L, C, M}
d. D = {x | x is a prime number less than 50}
e. R = {x : x is the Universities in Dumaguete City}
f. H = {x | x is the female president in the Philippines}

A set is simply a collection of objects. The individual objects are referred to as elements
of a sets, denoted by ∈, and the elements must be enclosed with curly braces or “{}” to be
identified as a set.
EXAMPLE:
A = {3, 6, 18, 27}
B = The set of available gadgets.
C = {x : x is a set of shapes}
There are two ways in writing a set:
• Roster Method – writing all the elements inside the curly braces, especially when the set
has finite number of elements or when its elements is not too large.
EXAMPLE:
S = {Math, Science, English, Filipino, TLE, MAPEH}
T = {Airplane, Train, Car, Helicopter, Ship, Motorcycle}
Z = {3, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18, 21, 24, 27}
• Rule Method (or Set-Builder Notation) – describing the elements by its property that is
necessary for membership, especially when a set is compose of a large finite set or an
infinite set.
EXAMPLE:
Q = {x : x is a positive, even integer}
W = {s : s is the states in the United States}
G = {a : a is a four-legged animal}
 The symbols “:” and “|” are read as “such that”.

The axiom of extension says that a set is completely determined by what its elements are−
not the order in which they might be listed or the fact that some elements might be listed more
than once.
Symbol Set
ℝ set of all real numbers
ℤ set of all integers
ℚ set of all rational numbers, or quotients of integers

ℕ ℤ ℚ ℝ 𝕀 ℂ 𝕎
Natural Integers Rational Real Imaginary Complex Whole
Numbers Numbers Numbers Numbers Numbers Numbers

Labels are given for a few real numbers corresponding to points on the line shown below.

• The real number line is called continuous because it is imagined to have no holes.
• The set of integers corresponds to a collection of points located at fixed intervals along
the real number line.
EXAMPLE:
Given that ℤ the set of all integers, and ℤ+ the set of all positive integers, describe each of the
following sets.
a. {x ∈ ℤ | -6 ≤ x < 3}
 When use say ℤ (or the integers), it is a number that is compose of negative numbers,
zero, and a positive number. Since the condition for x is it must be greater than or equal
to -6 but less than 3, so the elements of this set is {-6, -5, -4, -3, -2, -1, 0, 1, 2}.
b. {x ∈ ℤ | -4 < x < 8}
c. {x ∈ ℤ+ | -4 < x < 8}
(Try to analyze what are the elements of each set.)

REMARKS:
• Universal Set (𝑈) – a set that contains all elements of the given set.
• Empty Set (∅) – a set with no elements. It is also known as the null set.

Subsets
A basic relation between sets is that of subset. If A and B are sets, then A is called a subset
of B, if and only if, every element of A is also an element of B. Symbolically, A ⊆ B means that
“for all elements x, if x ∈ A then x ∈ B”. The phrases A is contained in B and B contains A are the
alternative ways of saying that A is a subset of B.

Proper Subset – is a subset which contains fewer elements of its parent set. Let A and B be sets.
A is a proper subset of B, if and only if, every element of A is in B but there is at least one element
of B that is not in A.
In order to illustrate the relation of each given set, we will be using the Venn Diagram. It
uses circles to show the relationships among things or finite group of things. Circles represents the
given sets and are enclosed in a rectangle which represents the universal set.
Take a look at the illustration below:

➢ What are the elements of set A? set B? set C?

➢ Is A considered as a proper subset of B?
➢ Does C a subset of B?
Examples:
1. Is A a proper subset of B, where A = {1,3, 4} and B = {1, 4, 3, 2}?
Solution:
Yes, A ⊂ B.

2. Let A be all multiples of 4 and B be all multiples of 2. Is A a subset of B? And is B a

subset of A?
Solution:
A = { …, -8, -4, 0, 4, 8, … }
B = { …, -8, -6, -4, -2, 0, 2, 4, 6, 8, … }
Therefore, A is a subset of B but B is not a subset of A.

3. Let A = ℤ+, B = {n ∈ ℤ | 0 ≤ n ≤ 100}, and C = {100, 200, 300, 400, 500}. Evaluate
the truth and falsity of the statement.
a. C ⊆ C
b. B ⊆ A
c. C is a proper subset of A
d. C and B have at least one element in common
e. C ⊆ B

Cardinality of Sets – is the number of elements in a given set, denoted by |S| where S is a set.
Power Set – a set that includes all the subsets including the empty set and the original set itself,
usually denoted by P.
EXAMPLE:
If set G = {e, o, u} is a set, then all its subsets {e}, {o}, {u}, {e, o}, {e, u}, {o, u},
{e, o, u} and {} are the elements of power set, such as:
Power set of G, P(G) = {∅, {e}, {o}, {u}, {e, o}, {e, u}, {o, u}, {e, o, u}} => where
P(G) denotes the power set.
It is also a type of set where the cardinality depends on the number of subsets formed for a given
set. In order to know the cardinality of the power set, we use |P(A)| = 2𝑛 where n is the number of
elements in a set.

SET OPERATIONS
Set operations is a concept similar to fundamental operations on numbers. There are four
main set operations which includes: Union of Sets, Intersection of Sets, Complement of a Set, and
Set Difference.
• Union of Sets
- In set theory, the union of a collection of sets is the set of all elements in the collection.
- Given two sets A and B, the union of the two sets is defined as the set of all elements
that belong to either A, or B, or both A and B.
- Union is denoted by ∪.
 EXAMPLE:
If A = {1, 3,7, 5} and B = {3, 7, 8, 9}. Find A∪B.
 A∪B = {1, 3, 5, 7, 8, 9}

• Intersection of Sets
- Given two sets A and B, the intersection of the two sets is defined as the set of all
elements that belong to both A and B.
- Intersection is denoted by ∩.

EXAMPLE:
If A = {2, 4, 6, 8, 10} and B = {1, 3, 8, 4, 6}. Find A∩B.
 A∩B = {4, 6, 8}

• Complement of a Set
- The complement of a set is defined as the set of all the elements in the given universal
set (𝑈) that are not present in that specific set.
- It is denoted by 𝐴′ 𝑜𝑟 𝐴𝑐 .

EXAMPLE:
Let U = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10}, A = {3, 1, 6, 4, 8}, and B = {8, 5, 2}. Find A’ and
B’.
 A’ = {2, 5, 7, 9, 10}
 B’ = {1, 3, 4, 6, 7, 9, 10}

• Set Difference
- The operation set difference implies subtracting the elements from a set which is similar
to the concept of the difference between numbers.
- The difference of the two sets A and B, denoted by A – B, are the list of all elements
that belong to A and do not belong to B.
 EXAMPLE:
Let A = {a, b, c, d, e, f} and B = {b, d, h, f, g}. Find A – B.
 A – B = {a, c, e}

Ordered Pairs
An ordered pair is a pair formed by two elements that are separated by a comma and written
inside the parentheses. For example, (x, y) represents an ordered pair, where 'x' is called the first
element and 'y' is called the second element of the ordered pair.

EXAMPLE:
Is (1,2) = (2,1)?
Solution:
No. By definition of equality of ordered pairs.
(1,2) = (2,1) if, and only if, 1 = 2 𝑎𝑛𝑑 2 = 1.
But 1 ≠ 2, and so the ordered pairs are not equal.

EXAMPLE:
10 1
Is (11, ) = (√121, )?
100 10
Solution:
Yes. By definition of equality of ordered pairs.
10 1 10 1
(11, ) = (√121, ) if, and only if, 11 = √121 𝑎𝑛𝑑 100 = 10.
100 10
Because these equations are both true, the ordered pairs are equal.

Cartesian Product
Cartesian product is the product of any two sets, but this product is ordered. The resultant
set contains all possible and ordered pairs such that the first element of the pair belongs to the first
set and the second element belongs to the second set. Since their order of appearance is important,
we call them first and second elements respectively. We use ordered pairs to obtain a new set from
two given sets A and B.
EXAMPLE:
Let 𝐴 = {1, 2} and 𝐵 = {𝑢, 𝑣}.
Find the following:
a. 𝐴 × 𝐵
b. B × 𝐴
c. B × 𝐵

Solution:
a. 𝑨 × 𝑩 = {(𝟏, 𝒖), (𝟏, 𝒗), (𝟐, 𝒖), (𝟐, 𝒗)}
b. 𝐁 × 𝑨 = {(𝒖, 𝟏), (𝒖, 𝟐), (𝒗, 𝟏), (𝒗, 𝟐)}
c. 𝐁 × 𝑩 = {(𝒖, 𝒖), (𝒖, 𝒗), (𝒗, 𝒖), (𝒗, 𝒗)}

SEATWORK:

Given the following sets: (U is a Universal Set)

U = {x | x is a natural number less than or equal to 25}

A = {1, 3, 5, 7, 11, 15, 13, 21, 23, 9, 17, 19, 25}
B = {12, 4, 5, 8, 14, 17, 20}
C = {22, 18, 2, 6, 12, 8, 16, 20, 4, 10, 14, 24}
D = {4, 2, 19, 13, 7, 20, 14, 11, 8}

Solve for the following.

a. U – [(A ∩ C) ∪ (D ∩ B)] d. A – (B – DC)
b. [(DC ∩ C) ∪ B]C e. [A ∩ (D ∪ C)]C – BC
c. A ∩ (C ∩ D)