Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 March 2014
In this paper we show that for n-th order languages L′ with p nonlogical constants, 2 ≦ n < ω, 0 ≦ p < ω, a notion of satisfaction can be defined in an n-th order language containing one additional nonlogical constant, say S. By the usual methods we also show that this notion cannot be defined in L′. Hence, in its present formulation, Beth's Theorem in [1] for first order languages has no analogue for L′.
Our defining expression is such that, given any values of the other nonlogical constants and any appropriate m-tuple, it allows us to determine whether or not the m-tuple belongs to the value S of S without considering the totality of objects which are of the same type as S. Whether every definition in an n-th order language is equivalent to one thus “predicative”, and hence whether there is a formulation of Beth's Theorem which generalizes to higher orders, we do not know.
The falsehood for L′ of the analogue of Beth's Theorem implies the falsehood of an analogue of an interpolation theorem for first order languages. The above definability of satisfaction for L′ implies a result on finite axiomatizability in slightly richer languages. Details are given in § 4.
To send this article to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about sending to your Kindle. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.
To save this article to your Dropbox account, please select one or more formats and confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you used this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your Dropbox account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.
To save this article to your Google Drive account, please select one or more formats and confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you used this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your Google Drive account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.