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How do you show, assuming the Axiom of Choice and the Continuum Hypothesis, that there exists a well-ordering on $[0,1]$ such that for all $x$, there are only countably many $y$ such that $y \leq x$?

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    Good; then you can probably make sense of Arturo's answer, though you may need to give it a bit of thought.2012-04-30

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If CH holds and AC both hold, then $[0,1]$ (which is bijectable with $\mathbb{R}$, hence with $2^{\aleph_0}$) is bijectable with $\omega_1$, the first uncountable ordinal. Let $f\colon [0,1]\to\omega_1$ be a bijection, and define the order with $x\leq y\iff f(x)\preceq f(y)$ (the right hand side is the usual ordering of ordinals).

Since $\omega_1$ is the first uncountable ordinal, every element of $\omega_1$ has only countably many elements strictly smaller than it, so for every $\alpha\in\omega_1$, $\{a\in\omega_1\mid a\preceq\alpha\}$ is countable. Thus, for any $x\in [0,1]$, only countably many reals can be strictly smaller than $x$ in this ordering.

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    Ah, ok. Thanks!2012-04-30