English

Categorical Geometry and Integration Without Points

Probability 2012-11-13 v4

Abstract

The theory of integration over infinite-dimensional spaces is known to encounter serious difficulties. Categorical ideas seem to arise naturally on the path to a remedy. Such an approach was suggested and initiated by Segal in his pioneering article \cite{segal}. In our paper we follow his ideas from a different perspective, slightly more categorical, and strongly inspired by the point-free topology. First, we develop a general (point-free) concept of measurability (extending the standard Lebesgue integration when applying to the classical σ\sigma-algebra). Second (and here we have a major difference from the classical theory), we prove that every finite-additive function μ\mu with values in [0,1][0,1] can be extended to a measure on an abstract σ\sigma-algebra; this correspondence is functorial and yields uniqueness. As an example we show that the Segal space can be characterized by completely canonical data. Furthermore, from our results it follows that a satisfactory point-free integration arises everywhere where we have a finite-additive probability function on a Boolean algebra.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1101.3762,
  title  = {Categorical Geometry and Integration Without Points},
  author = {Igor Kriz and Ales Pultr},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1101.3762},
  year   = {2012}
}

Comments

Accepted for publication in Applied Categorical Structures

R2 v1 2026-06-21T17:14:12.767Z