nLab finitary functor

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Idea

According to the usual definition, a functor F:CDF\colon C \to D is finitary if it preserves all filtered colimits. An important property is that a monadic category (over Set) is finitary (in other words, given by a Lawvere theory) if and only if its forgetful functor is finitary.

A slightly weaker definition is used in The Joy of Cats; there, FF is finitary if it maps every directed colimit in CC to a jointly epic diagram (but not necessarily a universal one) in DD. With this definition, an algebraic category is finitary if and only if its forgetful functor is finitary. The previous result also holds, since the two definitions are equivalent for monads on Set.

Last revised on July 18, 2021 at 08:42:02. See the history of this page for a list of all contributions to it.