Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge / 2024 / ii / Paper 2 / 23G / Solution

The Hahn-Banach theorem says that if $Y$ is a linear subspace of a real normed space $X$ and $g:Y\to \mathbb{R}$ is bounded and linear, then there is a bounded linear extension $G:X\to \mathbb{R}$ with $\Vert G\Vert =\Vert g\Vert$.

For $x\in X$, the map $\hat{x}(f)=f(x)$ is linear on $X^{\prime }$ andso $\hat{x}\in X^{\prime \prime }$ and $\Vert \hat{x}\Vert \le \Vert x\Vert$. The assignment $Jx=\hat{x}$ is visibly linear. If $x\ne 0$, define $g$ on $\mathrm{span}\{x\}$ byIt has norm one, and Hahn--Banach extends it to an $f\in X^{\prime }$ of norm one with $f(x)=\Vert x\Vert$. ThereforeThus the canonical embedding into the bidual is an isometry and

On $C([0,1])$, point evaluation $\ell (f)=f(0)$ has norm one for the $L^{\infty }$ norm, because a continuous function's essential supremum equals its supremum. Hahn--Banach extends it to $\Lambda \in (L^{\infty }{)}^{\prime }$. If $\Lambda$ were represented by some $g\in L^1$, thenfor every continuous $f$. Choose continuous $0\le f_n\le 1$ with $f_n(0)=1$ and support in $[0,1/n]$. Absolute continuity of the integral makes the right side tend to zero, while the left side is always one, a contradiction. This singular functional on L infinity proves

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