A characterisation of the category of compact Hausdorff spaces

We provide a characterisation of the category KH of compact Hausdorff spaces and continuous maps by means of categorical properties only. To this aim we introduce a notion of filtrality for coherent categories, relating certain lattices of subobjects to their Boolean centers. Our main result reads a...

Fuld beskrivelse

Bibliografiske detaljer
Main Authors: Marra, V, Reggio, L
Format: Journal article
Sprog:English
Udgivet: Theory and Applications of Categories 2020
Beskrivelse
Summary:We provide a characterisation of the category KH of compact Hausdorff spaces and continuous maps by means of categorical properties only. To this aim we introduce a notion of filtrality for coherent categories, relating certain lattices of subobjects to their Boolean centers. Our main result reads as follows: Up to equivalence, KH is the unique non-trivial well-pointed pretopos which is filtral and admits all set-indexed copowers of its terminal object.