Many mathematicians don't think so.
Category Theory has a category of sets. Integers/Rationals/Reals are different Objects (sets) in this category.
Type Theory is similar s/Category/Type.
Many mathematicians don't think so.
Category Theory has a category of sets. Integers/Rationals/Reals are different Objects (sets) in this category.
Type Theory is similar s/Category/Type.
We say, “the natural numbers are a subset of the reals,” and this is a sensible thing to say.
We also might say, “you construct each successor number in the natural numbers as n + 1 = n ∪ {n}”. And then we say, “a real number is a Cauchy sequence of rational numbers, or a Dedekind cut of rational numbers.” From a set-theoretic perspective, “the natural numbers are a subset of the reals” is obviously untrue with these definitions, and it’s worth spending a moment to think what the statement actually means, or how you would have to interpret it in order to understand the truth of the sentence.
I might translate the sentence as “there is a left-cancellative morphism from natural numbers to real numbers,” but then I’d have to define what category I’m using, and what the morphisms are—which is usually implied. You end up having to stand on top of a surprisingly tall stack of proofs in order to say “the natural numbers are a subset of the reals” and actually explain what you mean by that, rigorously, from foundations.
Or, put another way, it’s sometimes useful to understand what you mean by “behave as the identity”.
Obviously these reals are isomorphic to the cauchy reals. The reality, of course, is that no one actually works with foundations, they work with the intuitive understanding that 1:N is 1:Z is 1:Q is 1:R.
This is not as trivial as it sounds, which is why we invented all these different tools for explaining what “is” or “equals” means in mathematics without resorting to set equality (equality, isomorphism, equivalence, etc).
ZFC is a material set theory and is the most common set theory (and foundation).
It's different in a Structural Set Theory.
Michael Shulman: "Comparing material and structural set theories"
is really nice.
https://arxiv.org/abs/1808.05204
"In material set theories, the elements of a set X have an independent identity, apart from being collected together as the elements of X. Frequently, they are also sets themselves. These are also called “membership-based” set theories.
In structural set theories, the elements of a set X have no identity independentof X, and in particular are not sets themselves; they are merely abstract “elements” with which we build mathematical structures.