# Workshop on the Set-theoretic Multiverse, Konstanz, September 2022

Masterclass of “The set-theoretic multiverse” ten years after

Focused on mathematical and philosophical aspects of the set-theoretic multiverse and the pluralist debate in the philosophy of set theory, this workshop will have a master class on potentialism, a series of several speakers, and a panel discussion. To be held 21-22 September 2022 at the University of Konstanz, Germany. (Contact organizers for Zoom access.)

I shall make several contributions to the meeting.

### Master class tutorial on potentialism

I shall give a master class tutorial on potentialism, an introduction to the general theory of potentialism that has been emerging in recent work, often developed as a part of research on set-theoretic pluralism, but just as often branching out to a broader application. Although the debate between potentialism and actualism in the philosophy of mathematics goes back to Aristotle, recent work divorces the potentialist idea from its connection with infinity and undertakes a more general analysis of possible mathematical universes of any kind. Any collection of mathematical structures forms a potentialist system when equipped with an accessibility relation (refining the submodel relation), and one can define the modal operators of possibility $\Diamond\varphi$, true at a world when $\varphi$ is true in some larger world, and necessity $\Box\varphi$, true in a world when $\varphi$ is true in all larger worlds. The project is to understand the structures more deeply by understanding their modal nature in the context of a potentialist system. The rise of modal model theory investigates very general instances of potentialist system, for sets, graphs, fields, and so on. Potentialism for the models of arithmetic often connects with deeply philosophical ideas on ultrafinitism. And the spectrum of potentialist systems for the models of set theory reveals fundamentally different conceptions of set-theoretic pluralism and possibility.

### The multiverse view on the axiom of constructibility

I shall give a talk on the multiverse perspective on the axiom of constructibility. Set theorists often look down upon the axiom of constructibility V=L as limiting, in light of the fact that all the stronger large cardinals are inconsistent with this axiom, and furthermore the axiom expresses a minimizing property, since $L$ is the smallest model of ZFC with its ordinals. Such views, I argue, stem from a conception of the ordinals as absolutely completed. A potentialist conception of the set-theoretic universe reveals a sense in which every set-theoretic universe might be extended (in part upward) to a model of V=L. In light of such a perspective, the limiting nature of the axiom of constructibility tends to fall away.

### Panel discussion: The multiverse view—challenges for the next ten years

This will be a panel discussion on the set-theoretic multiverse, with panelists including myself, Carolin Antos-Kuby, Giorgio Venturi, and perhaps others.

# Set-theoretic and arithmetic potentialism: the state of current developments, CACML 2020

This will be a plenary talk for the Chinese Annual Conference on Mathematical Logic (CACML 2020), held online 13-15 November 2020. My talk will be held 14 November 17:00 Beijing time (9 am GMT).

Abstract. Recent years have seen a flurry of mathematical activity in set-theoretic and arithmetic potentialism, in which we investigate a collection of models under various natural extension concepts. These potentialist systems enable a modal perspective—a statement is possible in a model, if it is true in some extension, and necessary, if it is true in all extensions. We consider the models of ZFC set theory, for example, with respect to submodel extensions, rank-extensions, forcing extensions and others, and these various extension concepts exhibit different modal validities. In this talk, I shall describe the state of current developments, including the most recent tools and results.

# Modal model theory, STUK 4, Oxford, December 2019

This will be my talk for the Set Theory in the United Kingdom 4, a conference to be held in Oxford on 14 December 2019. I am organizing the conference with Sam Adam-Day.

## Modal model theory

Abstract. I shall introduce the subject of modal model theory, a research effort bringing modal concepts and vocabulary into model theory. For any first-order theory T, we may naturally consider the models of T as a Kripke model under the submodel relation, and thereby naturally expand the language of T to include the modal operators. In the class of all graphs, for example, a statement is possible in a graph, if it is true in some larger graph, having that graph as an induced subgraph, and a statement is necessary when it is true in all such larger graphs. The modal expansion of the language is quite powerful: in graphs it can express k-colorability and even finiteness and countability. The main idea applies to any collection of models with an extension concept. The principal questions are: what are the modal validities exhibited by the class of models or by individual models? For example, a countable graph validates S5 for graph theoretic assertions with parameters, for example, just in case it is the countable random graph; and without parameters, just in case it is universal for all finite graphs. Similar results apply with digraphs, groups, fields and orders. This is joint work with Wojciech Wołoszyn.

Hand-written lecture notes