Definition:Arbitrarily Large

Definition

Let $P$ be a property of real numbers.

We say that $\map P x$ holds for arbitrarily large $x$ (or there exist arbitrarily large $x$ such that $\map P x$ holds) if and only if:

$\forall a \in \R: \exists x \in \R: x \ge a: \map P x$

That is:

For any real number $a$, there exists a (real) number not less than $a$ such that the property $P$ holds.

or, more informally and intuitively:

However large a number you can think of, there will be an even larger one for which $P$ still holds.

or:

$\set {x: \map P x}$ is not bounded above.

Also see

• Definition:Sufficiently Large
• Definition:Arbitrarily Small

Sources

• 2021: Richard Earl and James Nicholson: The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Mathematics (6th ed.) ... (previous) ... (next): arbitrarily large/small