Left cosets are all in bijection

https://arbital.com/p/left_cosets_biject

by Patrick Stevens Jun 17 2016 updated Jun 17 2016

The left cosets of a subgroup in a parent group are all the same size.


Let H be a subgroup of G. Then for any two left cosets of H in G, there is a Bijective function between the two cosets.

Proof

Let aH,bH be two cosets. Define the function f:aHbH by xba1x.

This has the correct codomain: if xaH (so x=ah, say), then ba1ax=bx so f(x)bH.

The function is injective: if ba1x=ba1y then (pre-multiplying both sides by ab1) we obtain x=y.

The function is surjective: given bhbH, we want to find xaH such that f(x)=bh. Let x=ah to obtain f(x)=ba1ah=bh, as required.