De Bruijn–Erdős theorem (incidence geometry)

In incidence geometry, the De Bruijn–Erdős theorem, originally published by Nicolaas Govert de Bruijn and Paul Erdős in 1948, states a lower bound on the number of lines determined by n points in a projective plane. By duality, this is also a bound on the number of intersection points determined by a configuration of lines.

Although the proof given by De Bruijn and Erdős is combinatorial, De Bruijn and Erdős noted in their paper that the analogous (Euclidean) result is a consequence of the Sylvester–Gallai theorem, by an induction on the number of points.