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A constructive interpretation of Ramsey's theorem via the product of selection functions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 November 2014

PAULO OLIVA
Affiliation:
Queen Mary University of London, School of Electronic Engineering and Computer Science, London E1 4NS, United Kingdom Email: paulo.oliva@eecs.qmul.ac.uk, tpowell@eecs.qmul.ac.uk
THOMAS POWELL
Affiliation:
Queen Mary University of London, School of Electronic Engineering and Computer Science, London E1 4NS, United Kingdom Email: paulo.oliva@eecs.qmul.ac.uk, tpowell@eecs.qmul.ac.uk

Abstract

We use Gödel's dialectica interpretation to produce a computational version of the well-known proof of Ramsey's theorem by Erdős and Rado. Our proof makes use of the product of selection functions, which forms an intuitive alternative to Spector's bar recursion when interpreting proofs in analysis. This case study is another instance of the application of proof theoretic techniques in mathematics.

Type
Paper
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2014 

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