All entries for Thursday 12 January 2012

Obviousness – norm implies metric

We have a norm, which satisfies positivity, linearity and the triangle inequality. We have a metric, which satisfies positivity, symmetricity and the triangle inequality. We wish to prove that every norm is a metric. "Obviously", the only property we need to prove is... the triangle inequality.

At the time, I couldn't see how linearity implied symmetry was obvious. Now, I think it's about as obvious as the triangle inequality was - there's a step to take, even though it's simple.

Linearity requires that . Symmetricity requires that d(x,y)=d(y,x).

To prove it, we let d(x,y)= ||x-y|| = |-1|||x-y|| = ||-x-(-y)|| = ||y-x|| = d(y,x).

Christopher Midgley : 12 Jan 2012 10:39 |  Tags: Maths |  Comments (3) |  Close comments |  Report a problem