On the compact open and finest splitting topologies

In [M.H. Escardo, J. Lawson, A. Simpson, Comparing cartesian closed categories of (core) compactly generated spaces, Topology Appl. 143 (2004) 105–145] it is shown that in the set C(Nω,N) of all continuous maps of Nω into N, where N is an infinitely countable discrete topological space, the compact-open topology is not the finest splitting topology. Since Nω is consonant (see [S. Dolecki, G.H. Greco, A. Lechicki, When do the upper Kuratowski topology (homeomorphically, Scott topology) and the co-compact topology coincide? Trans. Amer. Math. Soc. 347 (1995) 2869–2884]) the Isbell topology on C(Nω,N) also is not the finest splitting topology. This result is generalized in the present paper proving that it is true also for spaces having the so-called Specific Extension Property. The following spaces have the Specific Extension Property: (a) infinitely countable free unions of non-empty spaces, (b) non-compact Lindelöf zero-dimensional spaces, and (c) metric locally convex linear spaces. In particular, we prove that on the set of all real-valued functions on the (separable infinite dimensional) Hilbert space the compact-open topology does not coincide with the finest splitting topology.