The logician Kurt Godel in 1951 established a disjunctive thesis about the scope and limits of mathematical knowledge: either the mathematical mind is equivalent to a Turing machine (i.e., a computer), or there are absolutely undecidable mathematical problems. In the second half of the twentieth century, attempts have been made to arrive at a stronger conclusion. In particular, arguments have been produced by the philosopher J.R. Lucas and by the physicist and mathematician Roger Penrose that intend to show that the (...) mathematical mind is more powerful than any computer. These arguments, and counterarguments to them, have not convinced the logical and philosophical community. The reason for this is an insufficiency if rigour in the debate. The contributions in this volume move the debate forward by formulating rigorous frameworks and formally spelling out and evaluating arguments that bear on Godel's disjunction in these frameworks. The contributions in this volume have been written by world leading experts in the field. (shrink)

If □ is conceived as an operator, i.e., an expression that gives applied to a formula another formula, the expressive power of the language is severely restricted when compared to a language where □ is conceived as a predicate, i.e., an expression that yields a formula if it is applied to a term. This consideration favours the predicate approach. The predicate view, however, is threatened mainly by two problems: Some obvious predicate systems are inconsistent, and possible-worlds semantics for predicates of (...) sentences has not been developed very far. By introducing possible-worlds semantics for the language of arithmetic plus the unary predicate □, we tackle both problems. Given a frame (W, R) consisting of a set W of worlds and a binary relation R on W, we investigate whether we can interpret □ at every world in such a way that □ $\ulcorner A \ulcorner$ holds at a world ᵆ ∊ W if and only if A holds at every world $\upsilon$ ∊ W such that ᵆR $\upsilon$ . The arithmetical vocabulary is interpreted by the standard model at every world. Several 'paradoxes' (like Montague's Theorem, Gödel's Second Incompleteness Theorem, McGee's Theorem on the ω-inconsistency of certain truth theories, etc.) show that many frames, e.g., reflexive frames, do not allow for such an interpretation. We present sufficient and necessary conditions for the existence of a suitable interpretation of □ at any world. Sound and complete semi-formal systems, corresponding to the modal systems K and K4, for the class of all possible-worlds models for predicates and all transitive possible-worlds models are presented. We apply our account also to nonstandard models of arithmetic and other languages than the language of arithmetic. (shrink)

This article is concerned with reflection principles in the context of Cantor’s conception of the set-theoretic universe. We argue that within such a conception reflection principles can be formulated that confer intrinsic plausibility to strong axioms of infinity.

This article explores ways in which the Revision Theory of Truth can be expressed in the object language. In particular, we investigate the extent to which semantic deficiency, stable truth, and nearly stable truth can be so expressed, and we study different axiomatic systems for the Revision Theory of Truth.

We investigate and classify the notion of final derivability of two basic inconsistency-adaptive logics. Specifically, the maximal complexity of the set of final consequences of decidable sets of premises formulated in the language of propositional logic is described. Our results show that taking the consequences of a decidable propositional theory is a complicated operation. The set of final consequences according to either the Reliability Calculus or the Minimal Abnormality Calculus of a decidable propositional premise set is in general undecidable, and (...) can be -complete. These classifications are exact. For first order theories even finite sets of premises can generate such consequence sets in either calculus. (shrink)

A correction is needed to our paper: to the definition contained within the statement of Lemma 1.5 and thus arguments around it in §3.

We show that assuming modest large cardinals, there is a definable class of ordinals, closed and unbounded beneath every uncountable cardinal, so that for any closed and unbounded subclasses $P, Q, {\langle L[P],\in,P \rangle }$ and ${\langle L[Q],\in,Q \rangle }$ possess the same reals, satisfy the Generalised Continuum Hypothesis, and moreover are elementarily equivalent. Examples of such P are Card, the class of uncountable cardinals, I the uniform indiscernibles, or for any n the class $C^{n}{=_{{\operatorname {df}}}}\{ \lambda \, | \, (...) V_{\lambda } \prec _{{\Sigma }_{n}}V\}$ ; moreover the theory of such models is invariant under ZFC-preserving extensions. They also all have a rich structure satisfying many of the usual combinatorial principles and a definable wellorder of the reals. The inner model constructed using definability in the language augmented by the Härtig quantifier is thus also characterized. (shrink)

We describe the solution of the Limit Rule Problem of Revision Theory and discuss the philosophical consequences of the fact that the truth set of Revision Theory is a complete 1/2 set.

We review some fundamental questions concerning the real line of mathematical analysis, which, like the Continuum Hypothesis, are also independent of the axioms of set theory, but are of a less ‘problematic’ nature, as they can be solved by adopting the right axiomatic framework. We contend that any foundations for mathematics should be able to simply formulate such questions as well as to raise at least the theoretical hope for their resolution.The usual procedure in set theory is to add so-called (...) strong axioms of infinity to the standard axioms of Zermelo-Fraenkel, but then the question of their justification becomes to some people vexing. We show how the adoption of a view of the universe of sets with classes, together with certain kinds of Global Reflection Principles resolves some of these issues. (shrink)

Gupta-Belnap-style circular definitions use all real numbers as possible starting points of revision sequences. In that sense they are boldface definitions. We discuss lightface versions of circular definitions and boldface versions of inductive definitions.

We claim that a recent article of P. Cotogno ([2003]) in this journal is based on an incorrect argument concerning the non-computability of diagonal functions. The point is that whilst diagonal functions are not computable by any function of the class over which they diagonalise, there is no ?logical incomputability? in their being computed over a wider class. Hence this ?logical incomputability? regrettably cannot be used in his argument that no hypercomputation can compute the Halting problem. This seems to lead (...) him into a further error in his analysis of the supposed conventional status of the infinite time Turing machines of Hamkins and Lewis ([2000]). Theorem 1 refutes this directly. The diagonalisation misunderstanding Infinite computation Conclusion. (shrink)

Gupta-Belnap-style circular definitions use all real numbers as possible starting points of revision sequences. In that sense they are boldface definitions. We discuss lightface versions of circular definitions and boldface versions of inductive definitions.

We show that the predicate “x is the power set of y” is ‐definable, if V = L[E] is an extender model constructed from a coherent sequences of extenders, provided that there is no inner model with a Woodin cardinal. Here is a predicate true of just the infinite cardinals. From this we conclude: the validities of second order logic are reducible to, the set of validities of the Härtig quantifier logic. Further we show that if no L[E] model has (...) a cardinal strong up to one of its ℵ‐fixed points, and, the Löwenheim number of this logic, is less than the least weakly inaccessible δ, then (i) is a limit of measurable cardinals of K, and (ii) the Weak Covering Lemma holds at δ. (shrink)

We investigate the set S 2 of "quickly sharped" reals: \begin{align*}S_2 &= \{x \mid x \in M, M \text{the} <^\ast-\text{least mouse} \not\in L\lbrack x\rbrack\} \\ &= \{x \mid L\lbrack x\rbrack \models "V = K"\},\\ \end{align*} in the manner of [K] defining a natural hierarchy and quasi-hierarchy of constructibility degrees and identifying their termination points.

We prove that a form of the $Erd\H{o}s$ property (consistent with $V = L\lbrack H_{\omega_2}\rbrack$ and strictly weaker than the Weak Chang's Conjecture at ω1), together with Bounded Martin's Maximum implies that Woodin's principle $\psi_{AC}$ holds, and therefore 2ℵ0 = ℵ2. We also prove that $\psi_{AC}$ implies that every function $f: \omega_1 \rightarrow \omega_1$ is bounded by some canonical function on a club and use this to produce a model of the Bounded Semiproper Forcing Axiom in which Bounded Martin's Maximum (...) fails. (shrink)

The use of Extended Logics to replace ordinary second order definability in Kleene’s Ramified Analytical Hierarchy is investigated. This mirrors a similar investigation of Kennedy, Magidor and Väänänen [11] where Gödel’s universe L of constructible sets is subjected to similar variance. Enhancing second order definability allows models to be defined which may or may not coincide with the original Kleene hierarchy in domain. Extending the logic with game quantifiers, and assuming strong axioms of infinity, we obtain minimal correct models of (...) analysis. A wide spectrum of models can be so generated from abstract definability notions: one may take an abstract Spector Class and extract an extended logic for it. The resultant structure is then a minimal model of the given kind of definability. (shrink)

We give the proof of a theorem of Jensen and Zeman on the existence of a global □ sequence in the Core Model below a measurable cardinal κ of Mitchell order ) equal to κ++, and use it to prove the following theorem on mutual stationarity at n.Let ω1 denote the first uncountable cardinal of V and set to be the class of ordinals of cofinality ω1.TheoremIf every sequence n m. In particular, there is such a model in which for (...) all sufficiently large m<ω, the class of measurables λ with oM≥ωm is, in V, stationary below m+2. (shrink)

We set $\mathscr{D} = \langle\mathscr{D}, \leq_L, \tt\#\rangle$ , where D is the set of degrees of nonconstructibility for countable sets of countable ordinals. We show how to define inductively over this structure the degrees of such sets of ordinals in K, the core model, and the next few core models thereafter, i.e. without reference to mice, premice or measurable cardinals.

We define a weak iterability notion that is sufficient for a number of arguments concerning $\Sigma _{1}$ -definability at uncountable regular cardinals. In particular we give its exact consistency strength first in terms of the second uniform indiscernible for bounded subsets of $\kappa $ : $u_2$, and secondly to give the consistency strength of a property of Lücke’s.TheoremThe following are equiconsistent:There exists $\kappa $ which is stably measurable;for some cardinal $\kappa $, $u_2=\sigma $ ;The $\boldsymbol {\Sigma }_{1}$ -club property holds (...) at a cardinal $\kappa $.Here $\sigma $ is the height of the smallest $M \prec _{\Sigma _{1}} H $ containing $\kappa +1$ and all of $H $. Let $\Phi $ be the assertion: TheoremAssume $\kappa $ is stably measurable. Then $\Phi $.And a form of converse:TheoremSuppose there is no sharp for an inner model with a strong cardinal. Then in the core model K we have: $\mbox {``}\exists \kappa \Phi \mbox {''}$ is -generically absolute ${\,\longleftrightarrow \,}$ There are arbitrarily large stably measurable cardinals.When $u_2 < \sigma $ we give some results on inner model reflection. (shrink)

We show in ZFC, assuming all reals have sharps, that a countable collection of ▵ 1 3 -degrees without a minimal upper bound implies the existence of inner models with measurable cardinals.

We show in ZFC, assuming all reals have sharps, that a countable collection of $\triangle^1_3$-degrees without a minimal upper bound implies the existence of inner models with measurable cardinals.