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I am trying to figure out the word/operation to what is not in the intersection of two sets but is in their union.

How I am going about this now is $(A \cup B) - (A \cap B)$

Is there a better way to go about this?

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    There are many alternative ways of writing the symmetric difference (when you don't have those curly brackets). E.g., for any two sets $A$ and $B$, $(A\cup B)-(A\cap B) = (A-B)\cup(B-A) = (A\cap B^c)\cup (B\cap A^c).$2011-06-27

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$(A \cup B) - (A \cap B)$ Is called the symmetric difference and is often denoted by $ A \Delta B $

It is analogous to the logical "exclusive or" operation (as union is analogous to "or" and intersection is analogous to "and").

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    It's frequently shortened to xor (or XOR).2011-06-28
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$(A \cap B^c)\cup (B\cap A^c)$