Let $A$ and $B$ be two sets of real numbers. Define the distance from $A$ to $B$ by $$\rho (A,B) = \inf \{ |a-b| : a \in A, b \in B\} \;.$$ Give an example to show that the distance between two closed sets can be $0$ even if the two sets are disjoint.
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Let $A = \mathbb N$ and let $B = \left\{n+\frac{1}{2n} :n\in \mathbb N\right\}$. Then A and B are closed and disjoint, but $$\inf \{|a−b|:a \in A,b \in B\} = \inf \left | \frac{1}{2n}\right| = 0$$ |
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Consider the sets $\mathbb N$ and $\mathbb N\pi = \{n\pi : n\in\mathbb N\}$. Then $\mathbb N\cap \mathbb N\pi=\emptyset$ as $\pi$ is irrational, but we have points in $\mathbb N\pi$ which lie arbitrarily close to the integers. |
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Let $A$ be the set of positive integers, and let $B$ be the set of all numbers of the form $n+1/n$, where $n$ ranges over the integers $\gt 1$. |
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