Indexed family in the context of Diagram (category theory)

In mathematics, the axiom of choice, abbreviated AC or AoC, is an axiom of set theory. Informally put, the axiom of choice says that given any collection of non-empty sets, it is possible to construct a new set by choosing one element from each set, even if the collection is infinite. Formally, it states that for every indexed family ${\displaystyle (S_{i})_{i\in I}}$ of nonempty sets, there exists an indexed set ${\displaystyle (x_{i})_{i\in I}}$ such that ${\displaystyle x_{i}\in S_{i}}$ for every ${\displaystyle i\in I}$. The axiom of choice was formulated in 1904 by Ernst Zermelo in order to formalize his proof of the well-ordering theorem.The axiom of choice is equivalent to the statement that every partition has a transversal.

In many cases, a set created by choosing elements can be made without invoking the axiom of choice, particularly if the number of sets from which to choose the elements is finite, or if a canonical rule on how to choose the elements is available — some distinguishing property that happens to hold for exactly one element in each set. An illustrative example is sets picked from the natural numbers. From such sets, one may always select the smallest number, e.g. given the sets {{4, 5, 6}, {10, 12}, {1, 400, 617, 8000}}, the set containing each smallest element is {4, 10, 1}. In this case, "select the smallest number" is a choice function. Even if infinitely many sets are collected from the natural numbers, it will always be possible to choose the smallest element from each set to produce a set. That is, the choice function provides the set of chosen elements. But no definite choice function is known for the collection of all non-empty subsets of the real numbers. In that case, the axiom of choice must be invoked.

In mathematics, a sequence is an enumerated collection of objects in which repetitions are allowed and order matters. Like a set, it contains members (also called elements, or terms). The number of elements (possibly infinite) is called the length of the sequence. Unlike a set, the same elements can appear multiple times at different positions in a sequence, and unlike a set, the order does matter. Formally, a sequence can be defined as a function from natural numbers (the positions of elements in the sequence) to the elements at each position. The notion of a sequence can be generalized to an indexed family, defined as a function from an arbitrary index set.

For example, (M, A, R, Y) is a sequence of letters with the letter "M" first and "Y" last. This sequence differs from (A, R, M, Y). Also, the sequence (1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8), which contains the number 1 at two different positions, is a valid sequence. Sequences can be finite, as in these examples, or infinite, such as the sequence of all even positive integers (2, 4, 6, ...).

In probability theory and related fields, a stochastic (/stəˈkæstɪk/) or random process is a mathematical object usually defined as a family of random variables in a probability space, where the index of the family often has the interpretation of time. Stochastic processes are widely used as mathematical models of systems and phenomena that appear to vary in a random manner. Examples include the growth of a bacterial population, an electrical current fluctuating due to thermal noise, or the movement of a gas molecule. Stochastic processes have applications in many disciplines such as biology, chemistry, ecology, neuroscience, physics, image processing, signal processing, control theory, information theory, computer science, and telecommunications. Furthermore, seemingly random changes in financial markets have motivated the extensive use of stochastic processes in finance.

Applications and the study of phenomena have in turn inspired the proposal of new stochastic processes. Examples of such stochastic processes include the Wiener process or Brownian motion process, used by Louis Bachelier to study price changes on the Paris Bourse, and the Poisson process, used by A. K. Erlang to study the number of phone calls occurring in a certain period of time. These two stochastic processes are considered the most important and central in the theory of stochastic processes, and were invented repeatedly and independently, both before and after Bachelier and Erlang, in different settings and countries.

A unique identifier (UID) is an identifier that is guaranteed to be unique among all identifiers used for those objects and for a specific purpose. The concept was formalized early in the development of computer science and information systems. In general, it was associated with an atomic data type.

In relational databases, certain attributes of an entity that serve as unique identifiers are called primary keys.In mathematics, set theory uses the concept of element indices as unique identifiers.

In mathematics, an index set is a set whose members label (or index) members of another set. For instance, if the elements of a set A may be indexed or labeled by means of the elements of a set J, then J is an index set. The indexing consists of a surjective function from J onto A, and the indexed collection is typically called an indexed family, often written as {A_j}_j∈J.

Zero-based numbering is a way of numbering in which the initial element of a sequence is assigned the index 0, rather than the index 1 as is typical in everyday non-mathematical or non-programming circumstances. Under zero-based numbering, the initial element is sometimes termed the zeroth element, rather than the first element; zeroth is a coined word for the ordinal number zero. In some cases, an object or value that does not (originally) belong to a given sequence, but which could be naturally placed before its initial element, may be termed the zeroth element. There is no wide agreement regarding the correctness of using zero as an ordinal (nor regarding the use of the term zeroth), as it creates ambiguity for all subsequent elements of the sequence when lacking context.

Numbering sequences starting at 0 is quite common in mathematics notation, in particular in combinatorics, though programming languages for mathematics usually index from 1. In computer science, array indices usually start at 0 in modern programming languages, so computer programmers might use zeroth in situations where others might use first, and so forth. In some mathematical contexts, zero-based numbering can be used without confusion, when ordinal forms have well established meaning with an obvious candidate to come before first; for instance, a zeroth derivative of a function is the function itself, obtained by differentiating zero times. Such usage corresponds to naming an element not properly belonging to the sequence but preceding it: the zeroth derivative is not really a derivative at all. However, just as the first derivative precedes the second derivative, so also does the zeroth derivative (or the original function itself) precede the first derivative.

In category theory, the product of two (or more) objects in a category is a notion designed to capture the essence behind constructions in other areas of mathematics such as the Cartesian product of sets, the direct product of groups or rings, and the product of topological spaces. Essentially, the product of a family of objects is the "most general" object which admits a morphism to each of the given objects.

In mathematics, the disjoint union (or discriminated union) ${\displaystyle A\sqcup B}$ of the sets A and B is the set formed from the elements of A and B labelled (indexed) with the name of the set from which they come. So, an element belonging to both A and B appears twice in the disjoint union, with two different labels.

A disjoint union of an indexed family of sets ${\displaystyle (A_{i}:i\in I)}$ is a set ${\displaystyle A,}$ often denoted by ${\textstyle \bigsqcup _{i\in I}A_{i},}$ with an injection of each ${\displaystyle A_{i}}$ into ${\displaystyle A,}$ such that the images of these injections form a partition of ${\displaystyle A}$ (that is, each element of ${\displaystyle A}$ belongs to exactly one of these images). A disjoint union of a family of pairwise disjoint sets is their union.

In mathematics, a sequence is a collection of objects possibly with repetition, that come in a specified order. Like a set, it contains members (also called elements, or terms). Unlike a set, the same elements can appear multiple times at different positions in a sequence, and unlike a set, the order does matter. The notion of a sequence can be generalized to an indexed family, defined as a function from an arbitrary index set.

For example, (M, A, R, Y) is a sequence of letters with the letter "M" first and "Y" last. This sequence differs from (A, R, M, Y). Also, the sequence (1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8), which contains the number 1 at two different positions, is a valid sequence. Sequences can be finite, as in these examples, or infinite, such as the sequence of even positive integers (2, 4, 6, ...), meaning that each element is twice the value of its position.

In probability theory and statistics, the marginal distribution of a subset of a collection of random variables is the probability distribution of the variables contained in the subset. It gives the probabilities of various values of the variables in the subset without reference to the values of the other variables. This contrasts with a conditional distribution, which gives the probabilities contingent upon the values of the other variables.

Marginal variables are those variables in the subset of variables being retained. These concepts are "marginal" because they can be found by summing values in a table along rows or columns, and writing the sum in the margins of the table. The distribution of the marginal variables (the marginal distribution) is obtained by marginalizing (that is, focusing on the sums in the margin) over the distribution of the variables being discarded, and the discarded variables are said to have been marginalized out.