Abstract

The category of nominal sets provides a mathematical model of names and binding based on simple, but subtle ideas to do with permutations of names and “finitely supported” mathematical objects that first arose in mathematical logic in the 1930s. Its use underlies a number of recent works on names and binding in computational logic, automated reasoning, programming language design and operational semantics. Relatively little use has been made of it for denotational semantics. Yet the key notion of finite support provides a syntax-independent model of “free occurrence of names” that really comes into its own when considering the kind of infinite mathematical objects that arise in semantics rather than syntax. So this talk will explain what is known so far about “doing domain theory in the category of nominal sets”, in the hope that some of the audience will be attracted to do some more.