A system of axiomatic set theory. Part IV. General set theory

Abstract

Our task in the treatment of general set theory will be to give a survey for the purpose of characterizing the different stages and the principal theorems with respect to their axiomatic requirements from the point of view of our system of axioms. The delimitation of “general set theory” which we have in view differs from that of Fraenkel's general set theory, and also from that of “standard logic” as understood by most logicians. It is adapted rather to the tendency of von Neumann's system of set theory—the von Neumann system having been the first in which the possibility appeared of separating the assumptions which are required for the conceptual formations from those which lead to the Cantor hierarchy of powers. Thus our intention is to obtain general set theory without use of the axioms V d, V c, VI. It will also be desirable to separate those proofs which can be made without the axiom of choice, and in doing this we shall have to use the axiom V*—i.e., the theorem of replacement taken as an axiom. From V*, as we saw in §4, we can immediately derive V a and V b as theorems, and also the theorem that a function whose domain is represented by a set is itself represented by a functional set; and on the other hand V* was found to be derivable from V a and V b in combination with the axiom of choice. (These statements on deducibility are of course all on the basis of the axioms I–III.)