A note on groups with finite dual spaces (Q2536809)

If a locally compact group has only a finite number of inequivalent irreducible unitary representations, then one is strongly tempted to conjecture that it is in fact a finite group. Indeed, one would expect to be able to find a proof of this fact somewhere in the early portion of an exposition on the theory of group representations. However, after some investigation the author believes that this theorem is as yet unproved in general, and therefore, although not of considerable research interest, it does remain as an annoying incompletion in the theory. The conjecture was known to be true in case the group was abelian or compact. We present here a proof in case the group satisfies the second axiom of countability.