User talk:Qedetc

Welcome

Welcome to ProofWiki! Since you're new, you may want to check out the general help page. It's the best first stop to see how things are done (next to reading proofs, of course!). Please feel free to contribute to whichever area of mathematics interests you, either by adding new proofs, or fixing up existing ones. If you have any questions please feel free to contact me, or post your question on the questions page.

Here are some useful pages to help get you started:

• Community Portal - To see what needs to be done, and keep up to date with the community.
• Recent Changes - To keep up with what's new, and what's being added.
• Check out our house style if you are keen on contributing.
• Main Page talk - This is where most of the main discussions regarding the direction of the site take place. If you have any ideas, please share them!

Cheers, prime.mover (talk)

Links and Categories

Please try and add a) links to definitions and any other proofs that a page depends on, and b) the category that you consider your proof to belong. That's the whole point of this site - being able to link each concept in a proof back to its source. As it is, I'm going through and adding a MissingLinks template and a category that a proof seems to belong to, but I'd rather be getting on with doing other stuff.

If the concepts and proofs required for an exposition do not exist yet (or you just can't find them) add a link anyway (it will appear red) rather than just ignore it. Please pretty please with a cherry on top. --prime mover 15:38, 2 June 2011 (CDT)

Thank you for your response. Please be aware that your work is valued, (particularly by me because it's areas of mathematics with which I am unfamiliar - all my postgraduate education has been strictly self-driven) but I for one am not confident that any cross-linking I do is going to be at all accurate. I understand your reluctance to get bogged down in the fiddly detail of all this when all you want to do is lay the results down - but be aware that if we do it, we may get some of the tying-together wrong!

I notice that there is significant crossover of terminology between this area of formal language theory / model theory which you're in the process of working on, and the point-set topology that I'm also working on (educating myself as I go). So significant is this, that I'm now wondering about the best way of establishing that linkage. No immediate urgency for that, it's something to put on the back-burner unless you have something solid in this area to document. --prime mover 16:18, 2 June 2011 (CDT)

To jump in -- I have no great aspirations to write new stuff at the moment so I'm quite happy to follow up and add in links where I can (though, as you know, they ought to be checked). So long as you're not too unhappy with my alterations, I'll go on linking stuff in with the results I'm aware of --Linus44 18:09, 2 June 2011 (CDT)

... and one more thing: note that links should not contain any LaTeX. If you want its presentation style to do so, fair enough - but think of a pithy way to interpret that link into English. Again, if it's too much trouble then do what you wanna do, but be aware that any link with LaTeX in it will be impossible to search on so we'd have to change it. --prime mover 00:15, 3 June 2011 (CDT)

Picking a page name is an art. My personal taste is for short names, the pithier the better, a bit like a newspaper headline. The trouble with that is that their intent can be confused. Not completely necessary to completely define the result in the page name, just enough to identify it. No matter, if the page name is crap it can always be moved to a new one. Variable names in page names - if you can't think of a better way, no worries. --prime mover 15:09, 3 June 2011 (CDT)

Crossover between formal language theory and topology

Well for one, there's ultraproduct which uses the concept of ultrafilter. Then there's the Compactness Theorem which may (or may not) have a topological isomorphism going on.

It sounds plausible, because point-set topology is concerned with the nature of sets which are or are not an element of a subset of the power set of a given set, and model theory does the same thing, by assigning a "true / false" or "satisfiable / unsatisfiable" label against a set which could be considered as being "open / closed" in the topological context. BUT ... do these topological concepts continue to hold in model theory?

Specifically, if it can be shown that the union of any collection of "satisfiable" models is also satisfiable, and the intersection of two satisfiable models is also satisfiable, then there's your isomorphism.

I haven't investigated any of this, I'm just rattling my fingers under the effect of late-Saturday-night chemicalisation, if you get my drift. --prime mover 17:06, 4 June 2011 (CDT)

I'll use this as an excuse to ramble then, and throw a bunch of text at you that I'm not sure of the value of. :D

First, I'll just throw this link at you http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultralimit and mention that there's some use of these ultrafilter based constructions in large-scale geometry stuff (like geometric group theory). I think the construction of asymptotic cones was developed or popularized or something like that by a model theorist. I don't know how deep those connections are though.

Perhaps closer to what you're thinking of is http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Type_%28model_theory%29#Stone_spaces . It's possible to define a topological space where, loosely speaking, points correspond to descriptions of elements under some fixed theory, and isolated points correspond to descriptions which must be satisfied by some element in each model of the theory. I'm badly paraphrasing one way of stating the omitting types theorem, which seems to be close to what you're speculating about. Separately I've seen these sorts of spaces used for quantifier elimination proofs. So there's definitely some useful interplay between topological thinking and what's going on in model theory. I guess this is further suggested by the fact that in continuous versions of logic / model theory (where you're allowing truth values in e.g. a bounded interval; this includes usual true/false valued logic as a special case), these kinds of type spaces can be given metrics, so they really do present some notion of "closeness" between descriptions of elements.

Though, the above isn't really on the level of theories like you seem to be suggesting, since it involves a fixed theory. Unfortunately, although an arbitrary intersection of satisfiable theories is always satisfiable (any model of one theory is a model of the intersection), a general union of satisfiable theories is not necessarily satisfiable, for example a theory which contains a sentence stating that there are exactly $n$ elements cannot be consistent with a theory which asserts that there are exactly $n+1$ elements. More generally, if $T$ contains a sentence $\phi$, then it is always inconsistent with the theory $\{\neg\phi\}$. So there isn't a topological space whose open sets are the consistent theories in some language.

I'll stop rambling now since I'm not sure how much of that is even readable. Qedetc 19:03, 4 June 2011 (CDT)

On the button. Exactly the sort of thing I was thinking about. Now I know there's something out there, I can check it out at leisure. Thx. --prime mover 02:46, 5 June 2011 (CDT)

Reinvention of Propositional / Predicate Calculus?

I've read a few books on logic on various levels, and one of the things that I've noticed is that they all say very much the same sort of thing but with different words, symbols and pictures. Ultimately it all boils down to the same thing.

I'm worried that we're about to have the same thing happen on this site. In particular the pages supporting the definition of "type" seem to repeat in a different form the same concepts that already exist in the Mathematical Logic section. Not quite sure what to do about it though, because most of this stuff is what I've taught myself so I don't know what the currently "fashionable" approach is, beyond the fact that modern scoffers sneer that Bourbaki's out-of-date and their approach is complete rubbish (because, ahem, we don't really understand it).

So what I'm trying to say is, careful with that axe, Eugene - see whether what's already there can be amended to hold your approach to this without reinventing everything and having two completely separate threads that say the same sort of thing in different language. --prime mover 14:30, 5 June 2011 (CDT)

This is definitely a valid concern, and I'm worried about it myself. I'm also concerned if I eventually want to add any continuous model theory stuff, because then the requirements for signatures and structures change a bit, and most of the ways I've speculated about so far for how that would be handled seem like they would be confusing for everyone else.

I think I hooked up most of the terms on the page Definition:Type (Model Theory) that needed defining with definitions that were already there. I've been putting off linking "satisfiable" to things because Definition:Satisfiable redirects to a page that defines it in terms of Definition:Boolean Interpretation. The definition I'm used to uses an assignment of variables to elements and then evaluation. It is really all the same, but the different levels (the boolean one feels more "proposition calculusy" to me than "predicate calculusy") and flavours of content (computability theory, proof theory, model theory) make it sound different.

I'd prefer not to pave 20 different roads to the same place, and I probably have in a few spots. I guess part of it so far has been that I'm still getting used to jumping on other people's work. I'm a bit weary of all the interconnections, and I'm not sure what the best way to add to or alter a definition is if it seems a bit off from the context I'm writing in.

Qedetc 15:50, 5 June 2011 (CDT)

Are you familiar with object-oriented programming? I wonder whether to use an approach similar to that, whereby there is a "basic" definition for the "proplog" stuff which has a "subclass" for "predlog" which has extra attributes. If you start with a definition which has the absolute raw basics in it, you can add a page (or if it works better, a subsection of the same page) which adds the appropriate extra bells and whistles for the extra requirements. See how Definition:Partition (Set Theory) and Definition:Partition (Topology) have been configured (although that's a lame example, can't think of a better one offhand). --prime mover 16:08, 5 June 2011 (CDT)

That seems like a natural way to do it. I guess using links to subsections similarly to how this works would be good practice?

Qedetc 17:18, 5 June 2011 (CDT)

Yes - and then I usually go a further step and set up a redirect page to that subsection so as to allow for splitting that subsection out into a separate page later if it evolves that way. --prime mover 00:35, 6 June 2011 (CDT)

apologies

I seriously admire your energy at tackling all this hairy stuff at the heart of metamathematics. I apologise for any waspishness - it's not justified and it's wrong. Keep on doing what you're doing - once we have all this in place, then we can start fleshing it out, tidying it up, putting all the links etc. in place. --prime mover 01:31, 9 June 2011 (CDT)

Title naming convention

Not every definition needs to have the name of the field of mathematics added to it. In particular, many of those definitions (Model Theory) probably only have a context in model theory at the moment, e.g. Monster Model.

It's only when we have more than one concept with the same (or similar) name that require the context being added.

The counter-argument is: "well, there might be another concept with the same name in another field of study, so I'll add the context just to make sure we won't have to rewrite it all later." Well that's as may be, but unless there's a specific one you know about (and can add that other one as well, so as to make sure we all know why the context has been added), please leave the context blank. For a start it keeps things neater and more streamlined. For another thing it's easier to find a page. There are probably other reasons but it's midnight where I am and I need some sleep.

I may go through and rename some of these definitions, so please be alert to the names of some of these things changing. If they genuinely need to be disambiguated, I will also raise a disambiguation page. --prime mover 18:01, 18 June 2011 (CDT)

I don't see how this is a big enough issue to warrant the change at the moment. Part of this is because I don't see much of an advantage to the non-parenthetically-titled pages.

(Side note: Categorical, divide, fork, minimal, saturated (I think), stable, type, universal all have meanings outside of the way they are used in model theory. I haven't added definitions for these, but so do algebraic, definable, independent, homogeneous, and simple, among others.)

Even when there isn't risk of colliding with definitions in other areas, I don't see much of an advantage (in either form or function) gained by removing the parentheses. The only time a reader sees the parenthetical part is when they're on a category definition page or actually on the definition page, since any time the page is linked the author invariably supplies the text for the link so it doesn't look like "Definition:..." anyway. It doesn't seem to affect finding pages much, since, for example, "divide", "divides", "dividing", and "k-..." variants of these would all be reasonable guesses for what the page name would be for the definition of dividing, "stable", "stability", "k-stable", etc would be reasonable for the definition of stable, and so on, but only one of these goes to the page. Just plugging in a guess at the page name into a URL isn't a good way of finding out whether the page exists currently. The more effective way to find a definition page (which is still not that great) seems to be searching for the word, and searching still shows the definitions as they are currently named.

If for some reason it was still desirable, another possibility (which wouldn't require changing a bunch of pages) would be adding redirect pages from non-parantheses-carrying pages to the parentheses-carrying ones. Plus then if it did need to be disambiguated later because a different definition was added, the redirect page could be retooled as a disambiguation page pretty easily.

I guess that goes the other way too though; I could be making pages with titles that didn't have parenthetical remarks about the area, but I could set up redirect pages to them that had parenthetical parts (on the off-chance someone does later add a colliding definition) and use those for links on the pages I create. I don't know. At the moment I don't see significant advantages to any of these ideas.

This just seems to me at the moment like an arbitrary style choice that doesn't really have a functional advantage, and I'm not at all convinced the time and effort spent changing it is time well spent. That said, if you want to go change them and update all the pages that link to them I'm not going to interfere. It just isn't clear to me why you'd want to (and also, I don't want to help with this since I don't understand it and it takes time and it's a minor annoyance to go update the pages so they link correctly).

-- Qedetc 19:01, 18 June 2011 (CDT)

Excuse me for being blunt, but your understanding of the aims and philosophy of this site is limited.

Please note the caveat at the bottom of the edit page: "If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly ... then do not submit it here." I would have just gone through and changed everything but I thought it was more polite to let you know what was going to happen.

Your input is valued, but please bear in mind that the site has a structure and format which we would like to maintain.

We already have a technique for redirection of non-parenthesis-bearing pages to parenthesissy ones, via disambiguation pages. They are set up as and when they are needed. This is part of the ongoing maintenance. Whether you think such changes are not "time well spent", that's neither here nor there. It's not your time that's going to be spent in doing it - you're already said you do this as a hobby and a learning experience, and have no interest in the long-term maintenance of the underlying structure.

So, despite your reservations, the changes I suggested will go ahead. Don't worry, nobody's going to make you change all the work you've done so far - but it would be nice if you were to limit the addition of "(Model Theory)" to any future pages you wish to add to those pages which already have a definition in the database.

As you will appreciate, adding pages of text to a wiki is easy. Crafting the pages into a coherent whole is far more challenging, and requires dedication. --prime mover 03:43, 19 June 2011 (CDT)

Incidentally, what is the meaning for a "monster model" outside of the context of model theory?

I understand that you've been here much longer, and I have a standing assumption that you have more familiarity with the aims of the site and more experience in maintaining overarching structure here since you've added huge chunks of material.

That said, my experience and anything else about me is irrelevant except in that it prompted me to say what I did. I think it's reasonable for anyone to comment on and question conventions and others' practices on a site like this. You told me you were planning to do something and I gave my view on it, explicitly stating that despite disagreeing with your reasons, I wouldn't act in some obstructive way. You can do whatever you want with that information. I'm not actively opposing what you're doing; I'm questioning the reasons and results of it.

This is a few times now that I've said something disagreeing with you and you've responded in a way that feels aggressive to me. Something is clearly wrong. Like I said before, if it's something with how I'm talking, feel free to let me know or give suggestions. Discussions like this aren't helping either of us accomplish anything.

And, I don't know of any uses of "monster model" outside of model theory; that's why it wasn't on the list above. Additionally, I don't know of any other uses of forking extension, indiscernible, isolated type, order indiscernible, and maybe type space.

--Qedetc 05:57, 19 June 2011 (CDT)

Shrug. I'm no politician, I talk bluntly, I piss people off. Sorry. If this is a problem, then, as I say, Shrug. --prime mover 06:38, 19 June 2011 (CDT)

I'm not getting pissed off. I'm concerned about whether/how I can communicate with you in a useful way. -- Qedetc 12:06, 19 June 2011 (CDT)

My problem is multifold: a) I know nothing about you (apart from the fact that you know your way around model theory better than I do) and therefore I don't have any idea as to your sensitivity of nature. b) From the perceived tone of your replies (e.g. your last posting) I have difficulty writing anything without aggrieving you. c) A certain amount of what you write irritates me, again in the perceived tone: "I don't see how ..." and "I don't see much of ...", because when I try to explain these things you appear to take it as a personal affront.

So, all emotional response aside, and excuse the personal question but I'm trying to work out a way of communication which will allow both of us to remain unflustered: is there anything about your personality (e.g. bipolar, passive/aggressive, Asperger's syndrome) that I need to know about so that I may be able to choose my words carefully so as not to come across as (in your words) "aggressive"? --prime mover 01:41, 20 June 2011 (CDT)

That's uncalled for Matt. This is a large project, and there are bound to be differences of opinion on stylistic issues. We've built this from the ground up and made most of the rules as we go, and members who haven't been a part of all those conversations are inevitably going to come to different conclusions about the best way to do things. If we expect everyone to handle things in exactly the same stylistic fashion, we are going to be sorely disappointed.

In this particular case, I tend to see the logic of both points of view: for those definitions which the original poster knows to multiple meanings, we might as well just give them the parenthetical categorization at the beginning rather than have to go change all the links whenever someone gets around to adding other contexts. Of course, for a term like Monster Model, we don't need the added parenthetical, so by all means get rid of it. Of course, if you want to remove all the parentheticals now with the assumption that some editor will put them back when they become necessary, feel free. --Alec (talk) 23:28, 20 June 2011 (CDT)

The parentheticals have (mostly) been cleared. --prime mover 00:24, 21 June 2011 (CDT)

Let me try and clear the air. I don't mean to sound aggressive but sometimes I pick the wrong words and string them together in an order which can be construed as impatient. I acknowledge this fact. Sorry.

In the case in point, I believe that to mechanically add the mathematical field in brackets to the title of every definition is a bad move. There are a few reasons that I can think of, e.g. a) that it makes creating links that much more unwieldy, b) that a particular definition may well apply to more than one field of mathematics, c) that it represents a stylistic change from the existing developed ProofWiki style, etc. The disagreements with this point of view were based mainly on the time it would take to change the existing links (at this stage, when there's not so much to do, it doesn't take a lot of time).

If you consider your argument against this point of view is still valid, then feel free to restate it in a different form. Having read your argument again, I can see there are merits to it, but I am still not completely convinced.

As I say, I don't know how to communicate in a diplomatic manner. I, like many others, respond to a "tone of voice" that I "hear" in what I read, which is a limitation. So I tend to unask the question, shrug and stroll on, and if the non-cerebral parts of the various brains involved in the conversation continue to get in the way then a choice needs to be made as to whether to acknowledge their presence and ignore them - or not. --prime mover 01:44, 21 June 2011 (CDT)

Empty links on home page

Doesn't matter. Nobody much monitors the "pages needed" page which is getting on for 2000 strong, some of which are spurious anyway. --prime mover 00:11, 23 June 2011 (CDT)