Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 April 2009
A set mapping on pairs over the set S is a function f such that for each unordered pair a of elements of S,f(a) is a subset of S disjoint from a. A subset H of S is said to be free for f if x∉ f({y, z}) for all x, y, z from H. In this paper, we investigate conditions imposed on the range of f which ensure that there is a large set free for f. For example, we show that if f is defined on a set of size K+ + with always |f(a)| <k then f has a free set of size K+ if the range of f satisfies the k-chain condition, or if any two sets in the range of f have an intersection of size less than θ for some θ with θ < K.