[PL-sem-jr] Talk tomorrow, Mon 11/16

[Aaron Turon]

PL Jr talk:
  Tomorrow, Mon 11/16 11:30-1:30, WVH164

Speaker: Dan

Basic category theory for λ-calculists

Category theory is an area of mathematics that works at very high
levels of abstraction to achieve very general results. In programming
language semantics, we work with myriad models--from simple sets of
program traces to probability distributions over sets of
functions--and the generality of category theory helps us identify
common structure in each. In this talk I will describe a few basic
structures in categories and show how we can use them to find models
for simply typed λ-calculi. Throughout, I will ground the abstract
categorical notions with familiar examples from computing and math,
and I will describe my own working intuitions for each in hopes of
dispelling some of the perceived voodoo of the subject. We will end up
with a class of categories--cartesian closed categories--that
circumscribe the class of denotational models for simply typed
λ-calculi.