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Re: [Coq-Club] Why do we have "Prop < Set" ? Why not just "Prop ≤ Set" ?


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  • From: Gaetan Gilbert <gaetan.gilbert AT ens-lyon.fr>
  • To: coq-club AT inria.fr
  • Subject: Re: [Coq-Club] Why do we have "Prop < Set" ? Why not just "Prop ≤ Set" ?
  • Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2017 21:08:37 +0100
  • Authentication-results: mail2-smtp-roc.national.inria.fr; spf=None smtp.pra=gaetan.gilbert AT ens-lyon.fr; spf=Pass smtp.mailfrom=gaetan.gilbert AT ens-lyon.fr; spf=None smtp.helo=postmaster AT labbe.ens-lyon.fr
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Coq already doesn't have subject reduction.

See attached file.

Gaëtan Gilbert

On 21/01/2017 20:13, Jason Gross wrote:
Note that relaxing this constraint also causes Coq to lose subject reduction on the inductive fragment (normally, I believe, it fails on the coinductive fragment but succeeds on the inductive fragment):

Inductive inhabited (X : Set) : Prop := inhabits (_ : X).
Constraint Set = Prop.
Scheme Induction for inhabited Sort Prop.
Fail Scheme Induction for inhabited Sort Set. (*Error: Induction on sort Set is not allowed for inductive definition inhabited.*)
Definition inhabited_rec
: forall (X : Set) (P : inhabited X -> Set), (forall x : X, P (inhabits X x)) -> forall i : inhabited X, P i
:= inhabited_ind_dep. (* success *)
Definition inhabited_rec'
: forall (X : Set) (P : inhabited X -> Set), (forall x : X, P (inhabits X x)) -> forall i : inhabited X, P i
:= Eval compute in inhabited_rec. (* Error:
Incorrect elimination of "i" in the inductive type "inhabited":
the return type has sort "Set" while it should be "Prop".
Elimination of an inductive object of sort Prop is not allowed on a predicate in sort Set
because proofs can be eliminated only to build proofs. *)

So at the very least, I think it would be tricky to make this change consistently across Coq.

On Sat, Jan 21, 2017 at 1:59 PM Jason Gross <jasongross9 AT gmail.com <mailto:jasongross9 AT gmail.com>> wrote:

Matej,

With your branch of Coq:

Set Universe Polymorphism.
Definition foo@{i j} (x : Type@{i}) := x : Type@{j}.
Set Printing Universes.
Section foo.
Universe i.
Constraint i = Prop. (* works fine in your branch, fails in
standard Coq with Error: Universe inconsistency. Cannot enforce i
= Prop because Prop < Set <= i. *)
Definition bar := foo@{Set i}.
End foo.
Eval compute in bar nat. (* = nat : Prop *)
Definition natP : Prop.
Proof.
let v := (eval compute in (bar nat)) in exact v.
Defined.
Print natP. (* natP = nat
: Prop
(* |= Prop = Set
*) *)

I had to jump through some hoops to work around other ad-hoc
restrictions that prevent collapsing things to Prop (polymorphic
universes can't normally be instantiated with [Prop], even when
you relax Prop < Set; monomorphic universes are always strictly
greater than Set, the subtyping relation must special-case Prop
and Set in some places, rather than going through the generic
universe comparison algorithm.)

Regarding your question
> I wonder why Coq infers that.
The command [Print Sorted Universes] collapses all universes to
the minimal universe they can inhabit. If you include the prelude
and [Print Sorted Universes], all of the universes in the prelude
get collapsed to Type.0. So since you don't have Prop < Set, Coq
infers that Set can be collapsed to Prop.

On Sat, Jan 21, 2017 at 1:09 PM Matej Kosik

<5764c029b688c1c0d24a2e97cd764f AT gmail.com

<mailto:5764c029b688c1c0d24a2e97cd764f AT gmail.com>>
wrote:

On 01/21/2017 06:03 PM, Jason Gross wrote:
> If you write
> (fun x : Set => (x : Prop))
> Coq will currently reject that. If you relax Prop < Set to
Prop ≤ Set, Coq will add the global constraint that Set ≤ Prop
and hence that Prop = Set, just as when you write

I wasn't able to reproduce what you say. In my branch where I
relaxed Prop < Set to Prop ≤ Set, this is what I see:

Welcome to Coq trunk (January 2017)

Coq < Print Universes.
Prop <= Set

Coq < Set Printing Universes.

Coq < Check fun x : Set => (x : Prop).
Toplevel input, characters 22-23:
> Check fun x : Set => (x : Prop).
> ^
Error:
In environment
x : Set
The term "x" has type "Set" while it is expected to have type
"Prop" (universe inconsistency: Cannot enforce Set = Prop).

which totally makes sense. The term:

fun x : Set => (x : Prop)

is not well-typed because Set is not a subtype of Prop.
(this is not the case of neither in the official Coq branches,
neither in my experiment).

Relaxing Prop < Set to Prop ≤ Set does not imply Set suddenly
becomes a subtype of Prop.

> (fun x : Type@{i} => (x : Type@{j}))
> Coq adds the constraint that i ≤ j.

It may. I fail to see how it is a problem (wrt what I asked).

>
> It might also be the case that you'd get this constraint in
more subtle situations, such as if you write
> Inductive inhabited (X : Set) : Prop := inhabits (_ : X).
> or if you write
> (forall X : Set, X) : Set

Welcome to Coq trunk (January 2017)

Coq < Print Universes.
Prop <= Set


Coq < Inductive inhabited (X : Set) : Prop := inhabits (_
: X).
inhabited is defined
inhabited_ind is defined

Coq < Print Universes.
Prop <= Set

>
> Does this answer your question?

Unfortunatelly, not. But think you (all) for the answers!

However, independently from your concrete arguments, which I
wasn't able to reproduce, there is more simple way to see that
something is wrong after these changes:


https://github.com/matej-kosik/coq/commit/2fcbb0ced3bc32210ae9fbf4acc40804841c9200

this:

Welcome to Coq trunk (January 2017)

Coq < Print Universes.
Prop <= Set


Coq < Print Sorted Universes.
Prop = Set

shows that Coq, somehow really decides (why?) infers that
"Prop = Set"
(regardless whether we add inhabitants to Set or not).

I wonder why Coq infers that.

This is consistent with what Hugo said.

Hm, I guess that the only way to find out is to look at the
implementation ...

>
>
> On Sat, Jan 21, 2017, 11:27 AM Matej Kosik

<5764c029b688c1c0d24a2e97cd764f AT gmail.com

<mailto:5764c029b688c1c0d24a2e97cd764f AT gmail.com>

<mailto:5764c029b688c1c0d24a2e97cd764f AT gmail.com

<mailto:5764c029b688c1c0d24a2e97cd764f AT gmail.com>>>
wrote:
>
> Hi Hugo,
>
> For me, the most surprising parts of you reply are:
>
> On 01/19/2017 11:58 PM, Hugo Herbelin wrote:
> >
> > The "Prop < Set" is technical: the universe-acyclicity
algorithm
> > internally needs to consider Prop <> Set to ensure
that Prop is not
> > accidentally equated to Set (*). Matthieu, who
introduced this for the
> > polymorphism of universes, confirmed.
>
> ...
>
> > (*) In particular, changing the line "enforce_univ_lt
Level.prop
> > Level.set empty" into "enforce_univ_le Level.prop
Level.set empty"
> > would be incorrect, unless other means are used to
ensure that the
> > algorithm does not eventually incorrectly conclude
that Prop = Set is
> > part of the logic.
>
> I wouldn't be surprised if Coq concluded that:
>
> X ≤ Z (* all inhabitants of X are also
inhabitants of Z *)
>
> from the following two universe constraints:
>
> X ≤ Y (* all inhabitants of X are also
inhabitants of Y *)
>
> Y ≤ Z (* all inhabitants of Y are also
inhabitants of Z *)
>
>
> Similarly, no surprise when it concludes:
>
> X = Y (* X and Y have the same inhabitants *)
>
> from these constraints:
>
> X ≤ Y (* all inhabitants of X are also
inhabitants of Y *)
>
> Y ≤ X (* all inhabitants of Y are also
inhabitants of X *)
>
>
> However, when you claim that Coq can conclude
>
> Prop = Set (* Prop and Set have the same inhabitants *)
>
> from, and solely from:
>
> Prop ≤ Set (* all inhabitants of Prop are also
inhabitants of Set *)
>
> isn't that counterintuitive for the user?
>
> Did I understand you correctly when you said that this
could really happen (if we imagine that "Prop < Set" was
relaxed to "Prop ≤ Set") ?
>
> Would Coq do this only in case of Prop and Set or in
general for any two universes?
>


--
Matej Košík


Set Primitive Projections.

Record R := C { p : nat }.
(* R is defined
p is defined *)

Definition f := fix f (x : R) : nat := p x.
(* f is defined *)

Definition Rtr (P : R -> Type) x (v : P (C (p x))) : P x
 := v.
(* Rtr is defined *)

Definition goal := forall x, f x = p x.
(* goal is defined *)

Definition thing : goal := fun x =>
(Rtr (fun x => f x = p x) x (eq_refl _)).
(* thing is defined *)

Definition thing_refl := eq_refl thing.
(* thing_refl is defined *)

Fail Definition thing_refl' := Eval compute in thing_refl.
(*
The command has indeed failed with message:
Illegal application: 
The term "@eq_refl" of type "forall (A : Type) (x : A), x = x"
cannot be applied to the terms
 "forall x : R, (fix f (x0 : R) : nat := let (p) := x0 in p) x = (let (p) := x in p)" : "Prop"
 "fun x : R => eq_refl" : "forall x : R, (let (p) := x in p) = (let (p) := x in p)"
The 2nd term has type "forall x : R, (let (p) := x in p) = (let (p) := x in p)"
which should be coercible to
 "forall x : R, (fix f (x0 : R) : nat := let (p) := x0 in p) x = (let (p) := x in p)".
*)



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