Weak n-categories: comparing opetopic foundations

We define the category of tidy symmetric multicategories. We construct for each tidy symmetric multicategory Q a cartesian monad (E_Q,T_Q) and extend this assignation to a functor. We exhibit a relationship between the slice construction on symmetric multicategories, and the `free operad' monad construction on suitable monads. We use this to give an explicit description of the relationship between Baez-Dolan and Leinster opetopes.Comment: 31 page

The category of opetopes and the category of opetopic sets

We give an explicit construction of the category Opetope of opetopes. We prove that the category of opetopic sets is equivalent to the category of presheaves over Opetope.Comment: 23 page

Distributive laws for Lawvere theories

Distributive laws give a way of combining two algebraic structures expressed as monads; in this paper we propose a theory of distributive laws for combining algebraic structures expressed as Lawvere theories. We propose four approaches, involving profunctors, monoidal profunctors, an extension of the free finite-product category 2-monad from Cat to Prof, and factorisation systems respectively. We exhibit comparison functors between CAT and each of these new frameworks to show that the distributive laws between the Lawvere theories correspond in a suitable way to distributive laws between their associated finitary monads. The different but equivalent formulations then provide, between them, a framework conducive to generalisation, but also an explicit description of the composite theories arising from distributive laws.Comment: 30 pages, presented at CT2011, lightly edited 2019 for publication in Compositionalit

Weak n-categories: opetopic and multitopic foundations

We generalise the concepts introduced by Baez and Dolan to define opetopes constructed from symmetric operads with a category, rather than a set, of objects. We describe the category of 1-level generalised multicategories, a special case of the concept introduced by Hermida, Makkai and Power, and exhibit a full embedding of this category in the category of symmetric operads with a category of objects. As an analogy to the Baez-Dolan slice construction, we exhibit a certain multicategory of function replacement as a slice construction in the multitopic setting, and use it to construct multitopes. We give an explicit description of the relationship between opetopes and multitopes.Comment: 41 page

A note on the Penon definition of nn-category

We show that doubly degenerate Penon tricategories give symmetric rather than braided monoidal categories. We prove that Penon tricategories cannot give all tricategories, but we show that a slightly modified version of the definition rectifies the situation. We give the modified definition, using non-reflexive rather than reflexive globular sets, and show that the problem with doubly degenerate tricategories does not arise.Comment: 14 pages, to appear in Cahiers de Topologie et Geometrie Differentielle Categorique