For the non-cartesian case see at distributive monoidal category.
With braiding
With duals for objects
category with duals (list of them)
dualizable object (what they have)
ribbon category, a.k.a. tortile category
With duals for morphisms
monoidal dagger-category?
With traces
Closed structure
Special sorts of products
Semisimplicity
Morphisms
Internal monoids
Examples
Theorems
In higher category theory
A category with finite products and finite coproducts is called (finitary) distributive if for any the canonical distributivity morphism
is an isomorphism. The canonical morphism is the unique morphism such that is , where is the coproduct injection, and dually for .
Equivalently, a category with finite products and coproducts is distributive if for any , the functor preserves finite coproducts.
This notion is part of a hierarchy of distributivity for monoidal structures, and generalizes to distributive monoidal categories and rig categories. A linearly distributive category is not distributive in this sense.
This axiom on binary coproducts easily implies the analogous -ary result for . In fact it also implies the analogous 0-ary statement that the projection
is an isomorphism for any (see Proposition below). Moreover, for a category with finite products and coproducts to be distributive, it actually suffices for there to be any natural family of isomorphisms , not necessarily the canonical ones (Lack).
A category with finite products and all small coproducts is infinitary distributive if the statement applies to all small coproducts. One can also consider -distributivity for a cardinal number , meaning the statement applies to coproducts of cardinality .
Any extensive category with finite products is distributive, but the converse is not true.
In a category with products and coproducts, if products distribute over binary coproducts, then coproduct coprojections are monic.
Let be a coproduct coprojection, and suppose given maps such that . We observe that the coprojection
is monic because it has a retraction . (All we need here is the existence of a map , for example the composite .)
The composite of the coprojection with the canonical isomorphism , namely , is therefore also monic. Given that , we conclude
whence since is monic. It follows that , as was to be shown.
If products distribute over binary coproducts, then products distribute over nullary coproducts (i.e., the projection is an isomorphism for all objects ).
We show that is initial. Clearly is inhabited by for any object . On the other hand, since the two coprojections coincide, the same holds for the two coprojections , by applying the distributivity isomorphism . This is enough to show that any two maps coincide, since given maps , we have .
In a distributive category, the initial object is strict.
Given an arrow , we have that is a retraction of , so that is a retract of . But retracts of initial objects are initial.
Every bicartesian closed category is distributive since in that case the cartesian product is a left adjoint and then the distributivity requirement is an instance of the preservation of colimits by left adjoints. For example,
But closedness is far from necessary, for example
is a distributive category.
These categories have in common that they are extensive. An example1 of a distributive category that is not extensive is given by
Since for posets viewed as categories, finite products and coproducts are given by meets and joins we find:
A further non-example:
The free distributive category on a category with finite products is given by the finite free coproduct completion: . That is, is distributive, and induces a bijection between distributive functors and product preserving functors , natural in distributive categories .
The free distributive category on a category is the finite free coproduct completion of the finite free product completion: . That is, is distributive, and induces a bijection between distributive functors and functors , natural in distributive categories .
In particular, then, the free distributive category, which is the free distributive category on the empty category, is the category of finite sets, up to equivalence.
Distributivity, in the sense of this page, is “incompatible” with certain other “linear” structures, at least in the sense that when combined they force the category to become thin.
If a category is distributive, and also linearly distributive with the same cartesian product and coproduct, then it is thin.
This can be found in Cockett-Seely 92
If a category has binary products that distribute over binary coproducts, and also has a monoidal structure that is compact closed, then it is thin.
See at compact closed category.
About distributive categories in general:
Aurelio Carboni, Stephen Lack, R. F. C. Walters, Introduction to extensive and distributive categories, JPAA 84 (1993) pp. 145-158 [doi:10.1016/0022-4049(93)90035-R]
Robin Cockett, Introduction to distributive categories, Mathematical Structures in Computer Science 3 (2009) 277-307 [doi:10.101/S0960129500000232]
Stephen Lack, Non-canonical isomorphisms, Journal of Pure and Applied Algebra 216 3 (2012) 593-597 [arXiv:0912.2126, doi:10.1016/j.jpaa.2011.07.012]
See also
Freyd, Lack, Lawvere et al: CATLIST discussion on extensive categories 1996
Wikipedia, Distributive category
For more see at distributive monoidal category.
Also cited above:
Robin Cockett, Robert Seely, Weakly Distributive Categories, in M.P. Fourman, P.T. Johnstone, A.M. Pitts, eds., Applications of Categories in Computer Science, London Mathematical Society Lecture Note Series 177 (1992), pp. 45–65. (book website)
Robin Houston, Finite Products are Biproducts in a Compact Closed Category, Journal of Pure and Applied Algebra, Volume 212, Issue 2, February 2008, Pages 394-400 (arXiv:math/0604542)
Pointed out by Peter Freyd in this discussion. ↩
Last revised on February 23, 2024 at 01:43:28. See the history of this page for a list of all contributions to it.