Categories, norms and weights

The well-known Lawvere category R of extended real positive numbers comes with a monoidal closed structure where the tensor product is the sum. But R has another such structure, given by multiplication, which is *-autonomous. Normed sets, with a norm in R, inherit thus two symmetric monoidal closed structures, and categories enriched on one of them have a 'subadditive' or 'submultiplicative' norm, respectively. Typically, the first case occurs when the norm expresses a cost, the second with Lipschitz norms. This paper is a preparation for a sequel, devoted to 'weighted algebraic topology', an enrichment of directed algebraic topology. The structure of R, and its extension to the complex projective line, might be a first step in abstracting a notion of algebra of weights, linked with physical measures.Comment: Revised version, 16 pages. Some minor correction

Finite Sets And Symmetric Simplicial Sets

The category of finite cardinals (or, equivalently, of finite sets) is the symmetric analogue of the category of finite ordinals, and the ground category of a relevant category of presheaves, the augmented symmetric simplicial sets. We prove here that this ground category has characterisations similar to the classical ones for the category of finite ordinals, by the existence of a universal symmetric monoid, or by generators and relations. The latter provides a definition of symmetric simplicial sets by faces, degeneracies and transpositions, under suitable relations

Higher fundamental functors for simplicial sets

This is a sequel to a previous paper, developing an intrinsic, combinatorial homotopy theory for simplicial complexes; the latter form the cartesian closed subcategory of 'simple presheaves' in !Smp, the topos of symmetric simplicial sets, or presheaves on the category of finite, positive cardinals. We show here how this homotopy theory can be extended to the topos itself, !Smp. As a crucial advantage, the fundamental groupoid functor !Smp --> Gpd is left adjoint to a natural functor Gpd --> !Smp, the symmetric nerve of a groupoid, and preserves all colimits - a strong van Kampen property. Similar results hold in all higher dimensions. Analogously, a notion of (non-reversible) directed homotopy can be developed in the ordinary simplicial topos Smp, with applications to image analysis as in the previous paper. We have now a 'homotopy n-category functor' Smp --> n-Cat, left adjoint to a nerve functor. This construction can be applied to various presheaf categories; the basic requirements seem to be: finite products of representables are finitely presentable and there is a representable 'standard interval'.Comment: Revised version with minor changes 36 pages, 428

An intrinsic homotopy theory for simplicial complexes, with applications to image analysis

A simplicial complex is a set equipped with a down-closed family of distinguished finite subsets. This structure, usually viewed as codifying a triangulated space, is used here directly, to describe "spaces" whose geometric realisation can be misleading. An intrinsic homotopy theory, not based on such realisation but agreeing with it, is introduced. The applications developed here are aimed at image analysis in metric spaces and have connections with digital topology and mathematical morphology. A metric space X has a structure of simplicial complex at each (positive) resolution e; the resulting n-homotopy group detects those singularities which can be captured by an n-dimensional grid, with edges bound by e; this works equally well for continuous or discrete regions of euclidean spaces. Its computation is based on direct, intrinsic methods.Comment: 46 page

The topology of critical processes, I (Processes and Models)

This article belongs to a subject, Directed Algebraic Topology, whose general aim is including non-reversible processes in the range of topology and algebraic topology. Here, as a further step, we also want to cover "critical processes", indivisible and unstoppable. This introductory article is devoted to fixing the new framework and representing processes of diverse domains, with minimal mathematical prerequisites. The fundamental category and singular homology in the present setting will be dealt with in a sequel.Comment: 23 page