an introduction to hyperlinear and sofic groups.pdf

AN INTRODUCTION TO HYPERLINEAR AND SOFIC GROUPS VLADIMIR G. PESTOV AND ALEKSANDRA KWIATKOWSKA Abstract. This is an edited writeup of lecture notes of the 7th Appalachian set theory workshop of the same title led by the first named author at the Cornell University on November 22, 2008. A draft version of the notes was prepared by the second named author. This presentation is largely complementary to the earlier survey by the firstnamed author (Hyperlinear and sofic groups: a brief guide, Bull. Symb. Logic 14 (2008), pp. 449480). 1. Motivation: group matrix models in the sense of classical first-order logic In these lectures, we will deal with a class of groups called hyperlinear groups, as well as its (possibly proper) subclass, that of sofic groups. One natural way to get into this line of research is through the theory of operator algebras. Here, the hyperlinear groups are sometimes referred to as “groups admitting matrix models”. This can be indeed interpreted as a genuine modeltheoretic statement, within a suitable version of logic. Namely, a group G is said to admit matrix models if every existential sentence of the firstorder theory of G is satisfied in matrix groups. What makes the concept interesting — and difficult to work with — is that at the matrix group end it is not the classical firstorder logic that one has in mind, but rather a version of continuous logic with truth values in the unit interval [0, 1]. By way of motivation, let us try to understand first what we get by considering a class of groups admitting matrix models in the sense of the traditional binary logic. The language of group theory, which we will denote L, is a firstorder predicate calculus with equality, having one ternary predicate letter S and a constant symbol e. The group operation is coded as follows: S (x, y, z)