Editing Order theory (section)

=== Duality ===
In the previous definitions, we often noted that a concept can be defined by just inverting the ordering in a former definition. This is the case for "least" and "greatest", for "minimal" and "maximal", for "upper bound" and "lower bound", and so on. This is a general situation in order theory: A given order can be inverted by just exchanging its direction, pictorially flipping the Hasse diagram top-down. This yields the so-called '''dual''', '''inverse''', or '''opposite order'''.

Every order theoretic definition has its dual: it is the notion one obtains by applying the definition to the inverse order. Since all concepts are symmetric, this operation preserves the theorems of partial orders. For a given mathematical result, one can just invert the order and replace all definitions by their duals and one obtains another valid theorem. This is important and useful, since one obtains two theorems for the price of one. Some more details and examples can be found in the article on [[duality (order theory)|duality in order theory]].