Critical theories of supervarieties of the variety of commutative associative rings (Q1920871)

The notion of an \(SA\)-critical theory was introduced by \textit{Yu. M. Vazhenin} [Algebra Logic 26, No. 4, 241-252 (1987); translation from Algebra Logika 26, No. 4, 419-434 (1987; Zbl 0647.03006)]. The description of \(SA\)-critical theories for many classes of rings, in particular, for all rings, all associative rings and all commutative rings is known. Let \({\mathcal A}\) and \({\mathcal C}\) be varieties of all commutative rings and all associative rings, respectively. In the article under review \(SA\)-critical theories of ring varieties \({\mathcal V}\) with \({\mathcal V}\supseteq A\cap C\) are investigated. Let \(B({\mathcal K})\) be the set of all \(SA\)-critical theories of a class of rings \({\mathcal K}\). The main result of the article is the following: Theorem 1. (i) Let \({\mathcal V}\) be a ring variety with \({\mathcal V}\supseteq A\cap C\). Then \(B({\mathcal V})\) is either \(\{\forall\}\) or \(\{\forall\exists, \forall\neg\vee\}\) or \(\{\forall\exists, \exists\forall\neg\vee\}\). (ii) Each of the three sets mentioned in item (i) is \(B({\mathcal V})\) for some ring variety \({\mathcal V}\) with \({\mathcal V}\supseteq A\cap C\). (iii) There exists no algorithm which, for a given ring variety \({\mathcal V}\) with \({\mathcal V}\supseteq A\cap C\), could determine \(B({\mathcal V})\). As a corollary of this theorem, the author describes \(SA\)-critical theories of the classes of all Jordan rings and all alternative rings. Namely, if \({\mathcal X}\) is one of these two classes then \(B({\mathcal X})=\{\forall\exists, \forall\neg\vee\}\). Theorem 2 states that \(B({\mathcal F})=\{\forall\exists, \forall\neg\vee\}\), where \({\mathcal F}\) is the class of all finite alternative rings. In particular, Theorem 2 implies that the word problem in the class \({\mathcal F}\) is undecidable. This gives a negative answer to a question of L. A. Bokut' in Dnestrovsk Notebook.