Questions tagged [continuous-geometry]

Use this tag for questions about lattices whose subspace dimensions can be a number in the interval [0, 1].

Continuous geometry is an analogue of complex projective geometry where instead of the dimension of a subspace being in a discrete set 0, 1, ..., n, it can be number in the interval [0, 1]. The first example of a continuous geometry other than projective space was projections of the hyperfinite type II factor.

A continuous geometry is a lattice L with the following properties:

  • L is modular.
  • L is complete.
  • The lattice operations ∧, ∨ satisfy a certain continuity property, $\big( \bigwedge_{α \in A}$ a$_α \big)$ ∨ b = $\bigwedge_α$(a$_α$ ∨ b), where A is a directed set and if α < β then a$_α$ < a$_β,$ and the same condition with ∧ and ∨ reversed.
  • Every element in L has a (not necessarily unique) complement. A complement of an element a is an element b with ab = 0, ab = 1, where 0 and 1 are the minimal and maximal elements of L.
  • L is irreducible, i.e., the only elements with unique complements are 0 and 1.
8 questions