Envelopes, indicators and conservativeness

Abstract

A well known theorem proved (independently) by J. Paris and H. Friedman states that BΣn +1 (the fragment of Arithmetic given by the collection scheme restricted to Σn +1‐formulas) is a Πn +2‐conservative extension of IΣn (the fragment given by the induction scheme restricted to Σn ‐formulas). In this paper, as a continuation of our previous work on collection schemes for Δn +1(T )‐formulas (see [4]), we study a general version of this theorem and characterize theories T such that T + BΣn +1 is a Πn +2‐conservative extension of T . We prove that this conservativeness property is equivalent to a model‐theoretic property relating Πn ‐envelopes and Πn ‐indicators for T . The analysis of Σn +1‐collection we develop here is also applied to Σn +1‐induction using Parsons' conservativeness theorem instead of Friedman‐Paris' theorem. As a corollary, our work provides new model‐theoretic proofs of two theorems of R. Kaye, J. Paris and C. Dimitracopoulos (see [8]): BΣn +1 and IΣn +1 are Σn +3‐conservative extensions of their parameter free versions, BΣ–n +1 and IΣ–n +1.