Instructor
Ron Freiwald
My Office
203A Cupples I
My Office Hours M 2:30-3:30, W
9:30-10:30 (between August 30 and December 20), and
by appointment
Office Phone
314-935-6737
Lectures
TuTh 1-2:30 in Earth & Planetary Sciences Building, room 203
We can also schedule special meetings to talk about problems if enough
people are interested.
Announcements,
Homework, etc.
Notes
for November 16 and November 21 lectures
If you have a copy of the Kaplansky textbook, you
should read (if you
haven't)
Chapter 1 (omitting
Section 1.3)
Chapter 2 up
through p. 34.
(You can read the rest
of Chapter 2 if you like. But it coveres and uses Zorn's Lemma --
an important too but one which I won't discuss until later. With
Zorn's Lemma, some of the results about cardinal arithmetic that (for
now) I omitted can be proven).
Chapter 4 and Chapter 5
For all lectures, you should
have read through all the notes handed out
in the preceding class. Make a note to yourself
about anything you don't understand, particularly for the part of those
notes that I have already covered in a lecture.
Exam 1
Solutions
Exam 2
Solutions
|
"Textbook"
Set Theory and Metric Spaces, Kaplansky (Chelsea
Publishing)
The "textbook" will not
actually be
followed closely.
Kaplansky's
little book is a very nicely written "classic" and is a useful
supplement to some
of
what we'll cover. Compared to most math books, it's quite
cheap.
The textbook will function primarily as supplementary reading. I
will
distribute textbook-like notes corresponding to the lectures each
week. The notes will also be posted here as pdf files.
In Math 417, we will cover
roughly the material corresponding to
Chapters
1,4,5 and 6 in Kaplansky's book, as well as parts of Chapter 2. There
will be a
lot of additional material covered in class as well. All
together, the course will comprise a substantial introduction to naive
set theory (with more to come in Math 418), all the important material
about metric spaces, and an introduction to the basic ideas about more
general topological spaces. More substantial work
in general topology comes in Math 418.
Exams
There will be the equivalent of four
exams in the course:
1) Exam 1 Tuesday, October 3 (in
class)
2) Exam 2 Take-home, given
out
in class on Thursday, November 2 and due in class
Tuesday, November 7.
3) Exam 3 Final exam, on Wednesday,
December 20, 1-3 pm
4) "Exam 4" See description under "Homework"
The "in-class" exam and the final
will be "short-answer", consisting
of such things as definitions, statements of theorems, giving
examples/counterexamples,
and true/false questions.
The “take-home" exam will consist
of more substantial questions,
analogous
to homework problems.
Homework
There will be 6-8 homework sets
during the semester. Usually these will be distributed in class
and be due in class three lectures later. Some of
the homework problems
are fairly routine, but many are quite challenging.
Most homework problems will be
read by a grader.However, about 6 times during the
semester, I will select a problem from your most recent homework (after
it's handed in) and grade that problem myself.
Your total accumulated score on
the homework problems I grade will
count
as "Exam 4". Your accumulated score on the remaining
homework
problems will count as your homework score.
Basis for Grading
The four exam scores and the
homework
score will each count about 20% of your
grade. However, homework
assignments are an essential part of the course. If a student
neglects these, the course grade may be dramatically lowered
(regardless
of test scores) at my discretion. I will not have a scale
for converting numeric scores into letter grades until the end of the
semester.
Academic Integrity
During examinations "in class" and
on take-home Exam 2, no
discussion
or consultation of any kind with any other person is permitted.
It is understood that on any
take-home work (tests or
homework) a student may consult class notes, the text, or any other
references—provided
the other references are explicitly documented. Generally
speaking, you should avoid trying to "find" solutions to problems
elsewhere.
Any solutions taken from other sources without documentation will
result
in a grade of 0 for the test or assignment and might be cause for
referral to the Academic Integrity Committee. If you have
questions about
what is appropriate, please ask me.
Students are encouraged to discuss
homework assignments with each
other;
you should share questions and ideas. It is a powerful way to learn the
concepts. Each student, however, must write up the homework
solutions
independently
in his/her own words and notation. One handy way to avoid
"borrowing
too much" from sessions with others is to talk together but not take
any
written notes away from the conversation. Suspicious similarities
between solution sets may be noted by the grader and may result in a
grade
of 0 for the homework.
Web Pages
The following web pages may be
give some interesting historical sidelights on
the
material.
