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Created a stub for Urysohn metrization theorem.
I put a Topology ToC on the page.
Crosslinked with Pavel Urysohn
I was always curious if any of various metrization theorems (Urysohn, Nagata-Smirnov, Bing, Moore, etc.) have an application where it is not immediately obvious how to write down a metric without invoking these theorems. The same question was asked by Jesse Kass without success on MathOverflow: https://mathoverflow.net/questions/93713/what-is-a-good-application-of-urysohns-theorem
That’s a very good question, Dmitri.
Re #5, a possible test case is:
If is a Hausdorff space that admits a continuous surjection , then is metrizable.
Is it immediately obvious how to write down a metric for , given ? I don’t know. A first guess might be to define the distance to be the Hausdorff metric between and , but it’s not so clear that this metric topology coincides with the original topology on . The proofs of metrizability I’ve seen use pretty indirectly, concluding that is compact Hausdorff and second-countable, whereupon Urysohn metrization kicks in.
The application then is to the “easy” direction of the Hahn-Mazurkiewicz theorem, the “only if” direction of the statement that a space is the continuous image of iff it is compact, metrizable, connected, and locally connected. It’s not quite an answer to the MO question, since that asked for a single space as opposed to a whole class of spaces.
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