Group Laws and Free Subgroups in Topological Groups

A proof is given that a permutation group in which differentfinite sets have different stabilizers cannot satisfy any grouplaw. For locally compact topological groups with this property,almost all finite subsets of the group are shown to generatefree subgroups. Consequences of these theorems are derived for:Thompson's group F, weakly branch groups, automorphism groupsof regular trees, and profinite groups with alternating compositionfactors of unbounded degree. 2000 Mathematics Subject Classification20B07, 20E10, 20E18, 20P05.