English

Borel Complexity and Potential Canonical Scott Sentences

Logic 2016-11-16 v3

Abstract

We define and investigate HC-forcing invariant formulas of set theory, whose interpretations in the hereditarily countable sets are well behaved under forcing extensions. This leads naturally to a notion of cardinality ||Phi|| for sentences Phi of Lω1,ωL_{\omega_1,\omega}, which counts the number of sentences of L,ωL_{\infty,\omega} that, in some forcing extension, become a canonical Scott sentence of a model of Phi. We show this cardinal bounds the complexity of (Mod(Phi), iso), the class of models of Phi with universe omega, by proving that (Mod(Phi),iso) is not Borel reducible to (Mod(Psi),iso) whenever ||Psi|| < ||Phi||. Using these tools, we analyze the complexity of the class of countable models of four complete, first-order theories T for which (Mod(T),iso) is properly analytic, yet admit very different behavior. We prove that both `Binary splitting, refining equivalence relations' and Koerwien's example of an eni-depth 2, omega-stable theory have (Mod(T),iso) non-Borel, yet neither is Borel complete. We give a slight modification of Koerwien's example that also is omega-stable, eni-depth 2, but is Borel complete. Additionally, we prove that I_{\infty,\omega}(Phi)<\beth_{\omega_1} whenever (Mod(Phi),iso) is Borel.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1510.05679,
  title  = {Borel Complexity and Potential Canonical Scott Sentences},
  author = {Douglas Ulrich and Richard Rast and Michael C. Laskowski},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1510.05679},
  year   = {2016}
}

Comments

Accepted for publication in Fundamenta Mathematicae

R2 v1 2026-06-22T11:24:07.143Z