Non-separability of the Lipschitz distance (Q740120)

Let \((X, d_{X})\) and \((Y, d_{Y})\) be metric spaces and \(\epsilon \geq 0\). A mapping \(f:X\rightarrow Y\) is said to be an \(\epsilon\)-isometry if \(f\) is a homeomorphism, \(f\) and \(f^{-1}\) are Lipschitz mappings, and \(|\log \text{dil}(f)| + |\log \text{dil}(f^{-1}) | \leq \epsilon\), where dil\((f) = \sup{\frac{d_{Y}(f(x),f(y))}{d_{X}(x,y)}}{x, y \in X, x \neq y}\) and dil\((f^{-1})\) is defined analogously. The Lipschitz distance \(d_{L}\) between \((X, d_{X})\) and \((Y, d_{Y})\) is defined to be the infimum of all \(\epsilon \geq 0\) such that there exists an \(\epsilon\)-isometry \(f:X\rightarrow Y\), or \(\infty\) if no \(\epsilon\)-isometry \(f:X\rightarrow Y\) exists. It was introduced by \textit{M. Gromov} in [Metric structures for Riemannian and non-Riemannian spaces. Boston, MA: Birkhäuser (1999; Zbl 0953.53002)]. It is well known that if \(\mathcal{M}\) is the collection of all isometry classes of compact metric spaces, then \((\mathcal{M}, d_{L})\) is a metric space that is complete but too big to be separable. Therefore the authors consider the following question: If \(X\) is a fixed compact metric space and \(\mathcal{M}_{X}\) is the collection of isometry classes of compact metric spaces \(Y\) such that \(d_{L}(X,Y) < \infty\), then is the metric space \((\mathcal{M}_{X}, d_{L})\) separable? They answer this question negatively by proving that, for two compact subsets \(X\) of the reals, \((\mathcal{M}_{X}, d_{L})\) is not separable. One of them is the unit interval, and the other one is an infinite union of shrinking closed intervals. Reviewer's remark: From a formal set-theoretic point of view, \(\mathcal{M}\) and \(\mathcal{M}_{X}\) are not sets. However, it can be shown that by choosing one representative from each isometry class one obtains a set.