Inaccessible Cardinal - Existence of A Proper Class of Inaccessibles

Existence of A Proper Class of Inaccessibles

There are many important axioms in set theory which assert the existence of a proper class of cardinals which satisfy a predicate of interest. In the case of inaccessibility, the corresponding axiom is the assertion that for every cardinal μ, there is an inaccessible cardinal κ which is strictly larger, μ < κ. Thus this axiom guarantees the existence of an infinite tower of inaccessible cardinals (and may occasionally be referred to as the inaccessible cardinal axiom). As is the case for the existence of any inaccessible cardinal, the inaccessible cardinal axiom is unprovable from the axioms of ZFC. Assuming ZFC, the inaccessible cardinal axiom is equivalent to the universe axiom of Grothendieck and Verdier: every set is contained in a Grothendieck universe. The axioms of ZFC along with the universe axiom (or equivalently the inaccessible cardinal axiom) are denoted ZFCU (which could be confused with ZFC with urelements). This axiomatic system is useful to prove for example that every category has an appropriate Yoneda embedding.

This is a relatively weak large cardinal axiom since it amounts to saying that ∞ is 1-inaccessible in the language of the next section, where ∞ denotes the least ordinal not in V, i.e. the class of all ordinals in your model.

Read more about this topic:  Inaccessible Cardinal

Famous quotes containing the words existence of a, existence, proper and/or class:

    ‘Tis going, I own, like the Knight of the Woeful Countenance, in quest of melancholy adventures—but I know not how it is, but I am never so perfectly conscious of the existence of a soul within me, as when I am entangled in them.
    Laurence Sterne (1713–1768)

    The star is the ultimate American verification of Jean Jacques Rousseau’s Emile. His mere existence proves the perfectability of any man or woman. Oh wonderful pliability of human nature, in a society where anyone can become a celebrity! And where any celebrity ... may become a star!
    Daniel J. Boorstin (b. 1914)

    A decent chap, a real good sort,
    Straight as a die, one of the best,
    A brick, a trump, a proper sport,
    Head and shoulders above the rest;
    How many lives would have been duller
    Had he not been here below?
    Here’s to the whitest man I know
    Though white is not my favourite colour.
    Philip Larkin (1922–1986)

    I am both a public and a private school boy myself, having always changed schools just as the class in English in the new school was taking up Silas Marner, with the result that it was the only book in the English language that I knew until I was eighteen—but, boy, did I know Silas Marner!
    Robert Benchley (1889–1945)