Complicial Sets Characterising The Simplicial Nerves Of Strict Omega Categories

The primary purpose of this work is to characterise strict $\omega$-categories as simplicial sets with structure. The author proves the Street-Roberts conjecture in the form formulated by Ross Street in his work on Orientals, which states that they are exactly the ``complicial sets'' defined and named by John Roberts in his handwritten notes of that title (circa 1978). On the way the author substantially develops Roberts' theory of complicial sets itself and makes contributions to Street's theory of parity complexes. In particular, he studies a new monoidal closed structure on the category of complicial sets which he shows to be the appropriate generalisation of the (lax) Gray tensor product of 2-categories to this context. Under Street's $\omega$-categorical nerve construction, which the author shows to be an equivalence, this tensor product coincides with those of Steiner, Crans and others.

The purpose of this book is to give background for those who would like to delve into some higher category theory. It is not a primer on higher category theory itself. It begins with a paper by John Baez and Michael Shulman which explores informally, by analogy and direct connection, how cohomology and other tools of algebraic topology are seen through the eyes of n-category theory. The idea is to give some of the motivations behind this subject. There are then two survey articles, by Julie Bergner and Simona Paoli, about (infinity,1) categories and about the algebraic modelling of homotopy n-types. These are areas that are particularly well understood, and where a fully integrated theory exists. The main focus of the book is on the richness to be found in the theory of bicategories, which gives the essential starting point towards the understanding of higher categorical structures. An article by Stephen Lack gives a thorough, but informal, guide to this theory. A paper by Larry Breen on the theory of gerbes shows how such categorical structures appear in differential geometry. This book is dedicated to Max Kelly, the founder of the Australian school of category theory, and an historical paper by Ross Street describes its development.

The technique of diagrammatic morphisms is an important ingredient in comprehending and visualizing certain types of categories with structure. It was widely used in this capacity in many areas of algebra, low-dimensional topology and physics. It was also applied to problems in classical and quantum information processing and logic. This volume contains articles based on talks at the Special Session, ``Diagrammatic Morphisms in Algebra, Category Theory, and Topology'', at the AMS Sectional Meeting in San Francisco. The articles describe recent achievements in several aspects of diagrammatic morphisms and their applications. Some of them contain detailed expositions on various diagrammatic techniques. The introductory article by D. Yetter is a thorough account of the subject in a historical perspective.

No scientific theory has caused more puzzlement and confusion than quantum theory. Physics is supposed to help us to understand the world, but quantum theory makes it seem a very strange place. This book is about how mathematical innovation can help us gain deeper insight into the structure of the physical world. Chapters by top researchers in the mathematical foundations of physics explore new ideas, especially novel mathematical concepts at the cutting edge of future physics. These creative developments in mathematics may catalyze the advances that enable us to understand our current physical theories, especially quantum theory. The authors bring diverse perspectives, unified only by the attempt to introduce fresh concepts that will open up new vistas in our understanding of future physics.

This book develops the theory of infinite-dimensional categories by studying the universe, or ∞-cosmos, in which they live.

The aim of this book is to explain modern homotopy theory in a manner accessible to graduate students yet structured so that experts can skip over numerous linear developments to quickly reach the topics of their interest. Homotopy theory arises from choosing a class of maps, called weak equivalences, and then passing to the homotopy category by localizing with respect to the weak equivalences, i.e., by creating a new category in which the weak equivalences are isomorphisms. Quillen defined a model category to be a category together with a class of weak equivalences and additional structure useful for describing the homotopy category in terms of the original category. This allows you to make constructions analogous to those used to study the homotopy theory of topological spaces. A model category has a class of maps called weak equivalences plus two other classes of maps, called cofibrations and fibrations. Quillen's axioms ensure that the homotopy category exists and that the cofibrations and fibrations have extension and lifting properties similar to those of cofibration and fibration maps of topological spaces. During the past several decades the language of model categories has become standard in many areas of algebraic topology, and it is increasingly being used in other fields where homotopy theoretic ideas are becoming important, including modern algebraic $K$-theory and algebraic geometry. All these subjects and more are discussed in the book, beginning with the basic definitions and giving complete arguments in order to make the motivations and proofs accessible to the novice. The book is intended for graduate students and research mathematicians working in homotopy theory and related areas.

Since the beginning of the modern era of algebraic topology, simplicial methods have been used systematically and effectively for both computation and basic theory. With the development of Quillen's concept of a closed model category and, in particular, a simplicial model category, this collection of methods has become the primary way to describe non-abelian homological algebra and to address homotopy-theoretical issues in a variety of fields, including algebraic K-theory. This book supplies a modern exposition of these ideas, emphasizing model category theoretical techniques. Discussed here are the homotopy theory of simplicial sets, and other basic topics such as simplicial groups, Postnikov towers, and bisimplicial sets. The more advanced material includes homotopy limits and colimits, localization with respect to a map and with respect to a homology theory, cosimplicial spaces, and homotopy coherence. Interspersed throughout are many results and ideas well-known to experts, but uncollected in the literature. Intended for second-year graduate students and beyond, this book introduces many of the basic tools of modern homotopy theory. An extensive background in topology is not assumed.

An introductory treatment to the homotopy theory of homotopical categories, presenting several models and comparisons between them.