nLab prelattice

Idea

Prelattices are lattices which do not necessarily satisfy antisymmetry.

In the same way as lattices, prelattices can be defined in an algebraic or an order-theoretic fashion. In the algebraic definition, one uses an equivalence relation $\approx$ instead of equality $=$ to define the equational axioms of the algebraic structure (commutativity, associativity, etc) as well as axioms that the algebraic operations are $\approx$-extensional, similarly to the setoid approach to algebra. In the order-theoretic definition, one assumes a preorder instead of a partial order.

Also in the same way as lattices, one could either assume that prelattices have top and bottom elements, in which those without top and bottom elements are unboounded prelattices or pseudoprelattices, or prelattices do not have top and bottom elements, in which those with top and bottom elements are bounded prelattices.

As a category

A bounded prelattice is equivalently a bicartesian monoidal preorder, a thin cartesian monoidal category which is also a cocartesian monoidal category. An unbounded prelattice is equivalently a thin locally cartesian category whose opposite category is also locally cartesian.

Examples

One example of bounded prelattices include Heyting prealgebras. Two other examples are the integers $\mathbb{Z}$ and the polynomial ring $K[x]$ of a discrete field $K$, with respect to the divisibility preorder $a \vert b$, the greatest common divisor $\gcd$, and the least common multiple $\lcm$; unlike the natural numbers, these only form a bounded prelattice because there are more than one element in the group of units of both $\mathbb{Z}$ and $K[x]$, where $\mathbb{Z}^\times \coloneqq \{1, -1\}$ and $K[x]^\times \coloneqq K^\times$.

Unbounded prelattices are important because given any ordered field $K$ with unbounded lattice structure, every ordered Artinian local $K$-algebra is a unbounded prelattice. Ordered Artinian local $K$-algebras are used in synthetic differential geometry.

 Related concepts

• preorder

• total preorder

• Heyting prealgebra

• prelattice-ordered ring

• prelattice object

References

• Franco Montagna, Andrea Sorbi, Universal recursion theoretic properties of r.e. preordered structures, Journal of Symbolic Logic. 1985;50(2):397-406. [doi:10.2307/2274228]

• Uri Andrews, Andrea Sorbi, Effective Inseparability, Lattices, and Preordering Relations, The Review of Symbolic Logic. 2021;14(4):838-865. [doi:10.1017/S1755020319000273]