# Giorgio Audrito, PhD 2016, University of Torino

Dr. Giorgio Audrito has successfully defended his dissertation, “Generic large cardinals and absoluteness,” at the University of Torino under the supervision of Matteo Viale.

The dissertation Examing Board consisted of myself (serving as Presidente), Alessandro Andretta and Sean Cox.  The defense took place March 2, 2016.

The dissertation was impressive, introducing (in joint work with Matteo Viale) the iterated resurrection axioms $\text{RA}_\alpha(\Gamma)$ for a forcing class $\Gamma$, which extend the idea of the resurrection axioms from my work with Thomas Johnstone, The resurrection axioms and uplifting cardinals, by making successive extensions of the same type, forming the resurrection game, and insisting that that the resurrection player have a winning strategy with game value $\alpha$. A similar iterative game idea underlies the $(\alpha)$-uplifting cardinals, from which the consistency of the iterated resurrection axioms can be proved. A final chapter of the dissertation (joint with Silvia Steila), develops the notion of $C$-systems of filters, generalizing the more familiar concepts of extenders and towers.

# Boldface resurrection and the strongly uplifting cardinals, the superstrongly unfoldable cardinals and the almost-hugely unfoldable cardinals, BEST 2014

I will speak at the BEST conference, which is held as a symposium in the much larger 95th Annual Meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, at the University of California at Riverside, June 18-20, 2014.

This talk will be for specialists in the BEST symposium.

Abstract.  I shall introduce several new large cardinal concepts, namely, the strongly uplifting cardinals, the superstrongly unfoldable cardinals and the almost-hugely unfoldable cardinals, and prove their tight connection with one another — actually, they are equivalent! — as well as their equiconsistency with several natural instances of the boldface resurrection axiom, such as the boldface resurrection axiom for proper forcing.  This is joint work with Thomas A. Johnstone.

I am also scheduled to give a plenary General Pubic Lecture, entitled Higher infinity and the foundations of mathematics, as a part of the larger AAAS program, to which the general public is invited.

# Strongly uplifting cardinals and the boldface resurrection axioms

• J. D. Hamkins and T. Johnstone, “Strongly uplifting cardinals and the boldface resurrection axioms.” (under review, http://arxiv.org/abs/1403.2788)
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Abstract. We introduce the strongly uplifting cardinals, which are equivalently characterized, we prove, as the superstrongly unfoldable cardinals and also as the almost hugely unfoldable cardinals, and we show that their existence is equiconsistent over ZFC with natural instances of the boldface resurrection axiom, such as the boldface resurrection axiom for proper forcing.

The strongly uplifting cardinals, which we introduce in this article, are a boldface analogue of the uplifting cardinals introduced in our previous paper, Resurrection axioms and uplifting cardinals, and are equivalently characterized as the superstrongly unfoldable cardinals and also as the almost hugely unfoldable cardinals. In consistency strength, these new large cardinals lie strictly above the weakly compact, totally indescribable and strongly unfoldable cardinals and strictly below the subtle cardinals, which in turn are weaker in consistency than the existence of $0^\sharp$. The robust diversity of equivalent characterizations of this new large cardinal concept enables constructions and techniques from much larger large cardinal contexts, such as Laver functions and forcing iterations with applications to forcing axioms. Using such methods, we prove that the existence of a strongly uplifting cardinal (or equivalently, a superstrongly unfoldable or almost hugely unfoldable cardinal) is equiconsistent over ZFC with natural instances of the boldface resurrection axioms, including the boldface resurrection axiom for proper forcing, for semi-proper forcing, for c.c.c. forcing and others. Thus, whereas in our prior article we proved that the existence of a mere uplifting cardinal is equiconsistent with natural instances of the (lightface) resurrection axioms, here we adapt both of these notions to the boldface context.

Definitions.

• An inaccessible cardinal $\kappa$ is strongly uplifting if for every ordinal $\theta$ it is strongly $\theta$-uplifting, which is to say that for every $A\subset V_\kappa$ there is an inaccessible cardinal $\gamma\geq\theta$ and a set $A^*\subset V_\gamma$ such that $\langle V_\kappa,{\in},A\rangle\prec\langle V_\gamma,{\in},A^*\rangle$ is a proper elementary extension.
• A cardinal $\kappa$ is superstrongly unfoldable, if for every ordinal $\theta$ it is superstrongly $\theta$-unfoldable, which is to say that for each $A\in H_{\kappa^+}$ there is a $\kappa$-model $M$ with $A\in M$ and a transitive set $N$ with an elementary embedding $j:M\to N$ with critical point $\kappa$ and $j(\kappa)\geq\theta$ and $V_{j(\kappa)}\subset N$.
• A cardinal $\kappa$ is almost-hugely unfoldable, if for every ordinal $\theta$ it is almost-hugely $\theta$-unfoldable, which is to say that for each $A\in H_{\kappa^+}$ there is a $\kappa$-model $M$ with $A\in M$ and a transitive set $N$ with an elementary embedding $j:M\to N$ with critical point $\kappa$ and $j(\kappa)\geq\theta$ and $N^{<j(\kappa)}\subset N$.

Remarkably, these different-seeming large cardinal concepts turn out to be exactly equivalent to one another. A cardinal $\kappa$ is strongly uplifting if and only if it is superstrongly unfoldable, if and only if it is almost hugely unfoldable. Furthermore, we prove that the existence of such a cardinal is equiconsistent with several natural instances of the boldface resurrection axiom.

Theorem. The following theories are equiconsistent over ZFC.

• There is a strongly uplifting cardinal.
• There is a superstrongly unfoldable cardinal.
• There is an almost hugely unfoldable cardinal.
• The boldface resurrection axiom for all forcing.
• The boldface resurrection axiom for proper forcing.
• The boldface resurrection axiom for semi-proper forcing.
• The boldface resurrection axiom for c.c.c. forcing.
• The weak boldface resurrection axiom for countably-closed forcing, axiom-A forcing, proper forcing and semi-proper forcing, plus $\neg\text{CH}$.

# Resurrection axioms and uplifting cardinals

• J. D. Hamkins and T. Johnstone, “Resurrection axioms and uplifting cardinals,” Archive for Mathematical Logic, vol. 53, iss. 3-4, p. p.~463–485, 2014.
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Abstract. We introduce the resurrection axioms, a new class of forcing axioms, and the uplifting cardinals, a new large cardinal notion, and prove that various instances of the resurrection axioms are equiconsistent over ZFC with the existence of uplifting cardinal.

Many classical forcing axioms can be viewed, at least informally, as the claim that the universe is existentially closed in its forcing extensions, for the axioms generally assert that certain kinds of filters, which could exist in a forcing extension $V[G]$, exist already in $V$. In several instances this informal perspective is realized more formally: Martin’s axiom is equivalent to the assertion that $H_{\frak{c}}$ is existentially closed in all c.c.c. forcing extensions of the universe, meaning that $H_{\frak{c}}\prec_{\Sigma_1}V[G]$ for all such extensions; the bounded proper forcing axiom is equivalent to the assertion that $H_{\omega_2}$ is existentially closed in all proper forcing extensions, or $H_{\omega_2}\prec_{\Sigma_1}V[G]$; and there are other similar instances.

In model theory, a submodel $M\subset N$ is existentially closed in $N$ if existential assertions true in $N$ about parameters in $M$ are true already in $M$, that is, if $M$ is a $\Sigma_1$-elementary substructure of $N$, which we write as $M\prec_{\Sigma_1} N$. Furthermore, in a general model-theoretic setting, existential closure is tightly connected with resurrection, the theme of this article.

Elementary Fact. If $\mathcal{M}$ is a submodel of $\mathcal{N}$, then the following are equivalent.

1. The model $\mathcal{M}$ is existentially closed in $\mathcal{N}$.
2. $\mathcal{M}\subset \mathcal{N}$ has resurrection. That is, there is a further extension $\mathcal{M}\subset\mathcal{N}\subset\mathcal{M}^+$ for which $\mathcal{M}\prec\mathcal{M}^+$.

We call this resurrection because although certain truths in $\mathcal{M}$ may no longer hold in the extension $\mathcal{N}$, these truths are nevertheless revived in light of $\mathcal{M}\prec\mathcal{M}^+$ in the further extension to $\mathcal{M}^+$.

In the context of forcing axioms, we are more interested in the case of forcing extensions than in the kind of arbitrary extension $\mathcal{M}^+$ arising in the fact, and in this context the equivalence of (1) and (2) breaks own, although the converse implication $(2)\to(1)$ always holds, and every instance of resurrection implies the corresponding instance of existential closure. This key observation leads us to the main unifying theme of this article, the idea that

resurrection may allow us to formulate more robust forcing axioms

than existential closure or than combinatorial assertions about filters and dense sets. We therefore introduce in this paper a spectrum of new forcing axioms utilizing the resurrection concept.

Main Definition. Let $\Gamma$ be a fixed definable class of forcing notions.

1. The resurrection axiom $\text{RA}(\Gamma)$ is the assertion that for every forcing notion $\mathbb{Q}\in\Gamma$ there is further forcing $\mathbb{R}$, with $\vdash_{\mathbb{Q}}\mathbb{R}\in\Gamma$, such that if $g\ast h\subset\mathbb{Q}\ast\mathbb{R}$ is $V$-generic, then $H_{\frak{c}}\prec H_{\frak{c}}^{V[g\ast h]}$.
2. The weak resurrection axiom $\text{wRA}(\Gamma)$ is the assertion that for every $\mathbb{Q}\in\Gamma$ there is further forcing $\mathbb{R}$, such that if $g\ast h\subset\mathbb{Q}\ast\mathbb{R}$ is $V$-generic, then $H_{\frak{c}}\prec H_{\frak{c}}^{V[g\ast h]}$.

The main result is to prove that various formulations of the resurrection axioms are equiconsistent with the existence of an uplifting cardinal, where an inaccessible cardinal $\kappa$ is uplifting, if there are arbitrarily large inaccessible cardinals $\gamma$ for which $H_\kappa\prec H_\gamma$.  This is a rather weak large cardinal notion, having consistency strength strictly less than the existence of a Mahlo cardinal, which is traditionally considered to be very low in the large cardinal hierarchy.  One highlight of the article is our development of “the world’s smallest Laver function,” the Laver function concept for uplifting cardinals, and we perform an analogue of the Laver preparation in order to achieve the resurrection axiom for c.c.c. forcing.

Main Theorem. The following theories are equiconsistent over ZFC:

1. There is an uplifting cardinal.
2. $\text{RA}(\text{all})$.
3. $\text{RA}(\text{ccc})$.
4. $\text{RA}(\text{semiproper})+\neg\text{CH}$.
5. $\text{RA}(\text{proper})+\neg\text{CH}$.
6. For some countable ordinal $\alpha$, the axiom $\text{RA}(\alpha\text{-proper})+\neg\text{CH}$.
7. $\text{RA}(\text{axiom-A})+\neg\text{CH}$.
8. $\text{wRA}(\text{semiproper})+\neg\text{CH}$.
9. $\text{wRA}(\text{proper})+\neg\text{CH}$.
10. For some countable ordinal $\alpha$, the axiom $\text{wRA}(\alpha\text{-proper})+\neg\text{CH}$.
11. $\text{wRA}(\text{axiom-A})+\neg\text{CH}$.
12. $\text{wRA}(\text{countably closed})+\neg\text{CH}$.

The proof outline proceeds in two directions: on the one hand, the resurrection axioms generally imply that the continuum $\frak{c}$ is uplifting in $L$; and conversely, given any uplifting cardinal $\kappa$, we may perform a suitable lottery iteration of $\Gamma$ forcing to obtain the resurrection axiom for $\Gamma$ in a forcing extension with $\kappa=\frak{c}$.

In a follow-up article, currently nearing completion, we treat the boldface resurrection axioms, which allow a predicate $A\subset\frak{c}$ and ask for extensions of the form $\langle H_{\frak{c}},{\in},A\rangle\prec\langle H_{\frak{c}}^{V[g\ast h]},{\in},A^\ast\rangle$, for some $A^\ast\subset\frak{c}^{V[g\ast h]}$ in the extension.  In that article, we prove the equiconsistency of various formulations of boldface resurrection with the existence of a strongly uplifting cardinal, which we prove is the same as a superstrongly unfoldable cardinal.