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François G. Dorais
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It is very near the bottom of Kanamori's chart. The very bottom is that of a (strongly) inaccessible cardinals, which is the smallest large cardinal axiom. Right above the inaccessible in the chart is α-inaccessible. It turns out that the Universe Axiom (UA) is strictly weaker than the existence of a 2-inaccessible cardinal. In fact, κ is 2-inaccessible if and only if Vκ ⊧ ZFC + UA.

Specifically, a cardinal κ is:

  • 0-inaccessible iff κ is regular,
  • 1-inaccessible iff κ is a regular strong limit of 0-inaccessibles,
  • 2-inaccessible iff κ is a regular strong limit of 1-inaccessibles,
  • etc.

So an inaccessible cardinal is exactly the same as a 1-inaccessible, which are also the cardinals κ such that Vκ ⊧ ZFC. If κ is 2-inaccessible, then there are unboundedly many inaccessibles λ < κ. These are inaccessible in Vκ too, which is why Vκ satisfies UA.

François G. Dorais
  • 44.4k
  • 6
  • 150
  • 233