Non-canonical isomorphisms (Q418912)

A category \(\mathcal{C}\) with finite (co)products is called \textit{distributive} provided that for every \(\mathcal C\)-objects \(A\), \(B\), \(C\), the canonical morphism \(\delta_{A,B,C}:(A\times B)+(A\times C)\rightarrow A\times(B+C)\) is an isomorphism (which is equivalent to the statement that for every \(\mathcal C\)-object \(A\), the functor \(A\times-:\mathcal C\rightarrow\mathcal C\) preserves binary coproducts) [\textit{A. Carboni} et al., J. Pure Appl. Algebra 84, No. 2, 145--158 (1993; Zbl 0784.18001)]. Moreover, a category \(\mathcal C\) with a zero object and finite (co)products is \textit{semi-additive} (namely, is enriched over the category of commutative monoids) provided that for every \(\mathcal C\)-objects \(A\), \(B\), the canonical morphism \(\alpha_{A,B}:A+B\rightarrow A\times B\) is an isomorphism (equivalently, the identity functor on \({\mathcal C}\) takes binary coproducts to binary products) [\textit{S. Mac Lane}, Categories for the working mathematician. 2nd ed. New York, NY: Springer (1998; Zbl 0906.18001)]. The paper under review proves that in both of the above-mentioned cases, it is enough to have not necessarily canonically constructed (but still, natural) isomorphisms (Theorems 4 and 5 on page 595, respectively). The author then shows that his two results are particular instances of a more general theorem, which involves braided monoidal categories and strong monoidal functors (Theorem 6 on page 596) [\textit{A. Joyal} and \textit{R. Street}, Adv. Math. 102, No. 1, 20--78 (1993; Zbl 0817.18007)]. As a consequence, one arrives at, e.g., the dual of Theorem 3.3 of \textit{M. Caccamo} and \textit{G. Winskel} [``Limit preservation from naturality'', Electron. Notes Theor. Comput. Sci. 122, 3--22 (2005)], which provides a sufficient condition for a functor \(F:\mathcal A\rightarrow\mathcal B\) between the categories with finite coproducts to preserve the latter (Corollary 8 on page 597). The paper is well written, conveniently contains the necessary preliminaries, and, moreover, both the obtained results and their proofs are clearly formulated.