New perspectives on semi-primal varieties

peer reviewedWe study varieties generated by semi-primal lattice-expansions by means of category theory. We provide a new proof of the Keimel-Werner topological duality for such varieties and, using similar methods, establish its discrete version. We describe multiple adjunctions between the variety of Boolean algebras and the variety generated by a semi-primal lattice-expansion, both on the topological side and explicitly algebraic. In particular, we show that the Boolean skeleton functor has two adjoints, both defined by taking certain Boolean powers, and we identify properties of these adjunctions which fully characterize semi-primality of an algebra. Lastly, we give a new characterization of canonical extensions of algebras in semi-primal varieties in terms of their Boolean skeletons

Structural and universal completeness in algebra and logic

In this work we study the notions of structural and universal completeness both from the algebraic and logical point of view. In particular, we provide new algebraic characterizations of quasivarieties that are actively and passively universally complete, and passively structurally complete. We apply these general results to varieties of bounded lattices and to quasivarieties related to substructural logics. In particular we show that a substructural logic satisfying weakening is passively structurally complete if and only if every classical contradiction is explosive in it. Moreover, we fully characterize the passively structurally complete varieties of MTL-algebras, i.e., bounded commutative integral residuated lattices generated by chains.Comment: This is a preprin

Bunched logics: a uniform approach

Bunched logics have found themselves to be key tools in modern computer science, in particular through the industrial-level program verification formalism Separation Logic. Despite this—and in contrast to adjacent families of logics like modal and substructural logic—there is a lack of uniform methodology in their study, leaving many evident variants uninvestigated and many open problems unresolved. In this thesis we investigate the family of bunched logics—including previously unexplored intuitionistic variants—through two uniform frameworks. The first is a system of duality theorems that relate the algebraic and Kripke-style interpretations of the logics; the second, a modular framework of tableaux calculi that are sound and complete for both the core logics themselves, as well as many classes of bunched logic model important for applications in program verification and systems modelling. In doing so we are able to resolve a number of open problems in the literature, including soundness and completeness theorems for intuitionistic variants of bunched logics, classes of Separation Logic models and layered graph models; decidability of layered graph logics; a characterisation theorem for the classes of bunched logic model definable by bunched logic formulae; and the failure of Craig interpolation for principal bunched logics. We also extend our duality theorems to the categorical structures suitable for interpreting predicate versions of the logics, in particular hyperdoctrinal structures used frequently in Separation Logic