Tame topology over definable uniform structures (Q2134276): Difference between revisions

In a first-order structure \(\mathfrak M\) carrying a natural topology, one would often like the definable sets to be ``tame'' (or ``geometric'') in some sense. There are various different axiomatic conditions (which apply in different settings) which imply such tame behaviour, like o-minimality (for real closed fields) or \(P\)-minimality (for \(p\)-adically closed fields). Tameness usually means in particular that definable functions are almost everywhere continuous, that there is a well-behaved notion of dimension, and that every definable set can be decomposed into finitely ``cells'' (i.e., particularly simple definable sets). The present paper provides an abstract tameness notion generalizing (among others) o-minimality and \(P\)-minimality: A ``visceral structure'' is a structure \(\mathfrak M\) together with a uniformly definable base for a topology satisfying some simple and natural axioms. The authors prove that in such a structure, definable functions are almost everywhere continuous. (To be precise, one should also assume that \(\mathfrak M\) is \(\omega\)-saturated.) Under some natural additional conditions, they also obtain dimension theory and a weak form of cell decomposition. There exist several other abstract tameness notions in the literature; at the end of the introduction, the paper explains how the viscerality relates to them. (Many of the previous notions need stronger assumptions.) The authors also mention various settings to which their theory applies; for example, every weakly o-minimal divisible ordered abelian group is a visceral structure, and it satisfies the assumption needed for cell decomposition. At the end of the paper, there is also a section with several concrete (new) examples of visceral structures.