Eberlein theorem and norm continuity of pointwise continuous mappings into function spaces (Q2448754)

For a completely regular topological space \(T\), the set \(C(T)\) of all continuous real-valued functions on \(T\), with the topology of pointwise convergence, is denoted by \(C_p(T)\). For a completely regular space \(T\), it is \textit{pseudocompact} if every function in \(C(T)\) is bounded. When \(T\) is completely regular and pseudocompact, \(C(T)\) is the same as \(C(\beta T)\), where \(\beta T\) is the Čech-Stone compactification of \(T\). There are three topologies on the space: the topology of pointwise convergence in \(T\), the topology of pointwise convergence in \(\beta T\); the weak topology of the Banach space \(C(\beta T, \| \cdot \|)\), where \(\|f\| = \max\{|f(t): t\in \beta T\}\). A subset \(A\) in a completely regular space \(T\) is \textit{strongly bounded} iff \(A\) contains a dense subset \(D\) such that every infinite subset \(C \subset D\) has a separable subspace \(S \subset T\) where \(S \cap C\) is infinite and bounded in \(S\), i.e., every function in \(C(T)\) is bounded on \(S\). The space \(T\) is \textit{strongly pseudocompact} iff it is strongly bounded in itself. With these notions, the authors show that if \(T\) is strongly pseudocompact (pseudocompact) completely regular, and \(A\) is a bounded (strongly bounded) in \(C_p(T)\), then \(\bar{A}\) is a compact subset of \(C_p(T)\). (They also show that if \(T\) is strongly pseudocompact, \(A\) is strongly bounded in \(C_p(T)\) and is contained in some ball in \(C(t)\), then \(\bar{A}\) is compact with respect to the weak topology of \(C(\beta T, \| \cdot \|)\).) This generalizes \textit{W. F. Eberlein}'s theorem [Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 33, 51--53 (1947; Zbl 0029.26902)] and leads to the topic of norm continuity of pointwise continuous mappings (which stems from the topic of joint continuity of separately continuous functions). Using two games similar to a variation of the Banach-Mazur game, the paper shows that if \(T\) is strongly pseudocompact, for any continuous map on certain Baire spaces \(X\) (e.g., \(X\) is pseudocompact) \(h: X \to C_p(T)\), there exists a dense \(G_\delta\) set in \(X\) where \(h\) is continuous with respect to the norm topology in \(C(T)\). The same result holds if \(T\) is pseudocompact and \(X\) is strongly pseudocompact.