Abstract

LetSbe the group of all permutations of the set of natural numbers. The cofinality spectrumCF(S)ofSis the set of all regular cardinalsλsuch thatScan be expressed as the union of a chain ofλproper subgroups. This paper investigates which setsCof regular uncountable cardinals can be the cofinality spectrum ofS. The following theorem.is the main result of this paper.Theorem.Suppose that V ⊨ GCH. Let C be a set of regular uncountable cardinals which satisfies the following conditions.(a)C contains a maximum element.(b)Ifμis an inaccessible cardinal such thatμ= sup(C∩μ),thenμ∈C.(c)ifμis a singular cardinal such thatμ= sup(C∩μ),thenμ+∈C.Then there exists a c.c.c. notion of forcing ℙ such that Vℙ⊨ CF(S) = C.We shall also investigate the connections between the cofinality spectrum andpcftheory; and show thatCF(S)cannot be an arbitrarily prescribed set of regular uncountable cardinals.