Combinatorial structure of type dependency

Article history: Received 7 June 2014 Available online 16 October 2014 Communicated by G. Rosolini MSC: 03B15; 03G30 We give an account of the basic combinatorial structure underlying the notion of type dependency. We do so by considering the category of generalised algebraic theories in the sense of Cartmell, and exhibiting it as the category of algebras for a monad on a presheaf category. The objects of the presheaf category encode the basic judgements of a dependent sequent calculus, while the action of the monad encodes the deduction rules; so by giving an explicit description of the monad, we obtain an explicit account of the combinatorics of type dependency. We find that this combinatorics is controlled by a particular kind of decorated ordered tree, familiar from computer science and from innocent game semantics. Furthermore, we find that the monad at issue is of a particularly well-behaved kind: it is local right adjoint in the sense of Street–Weber. In future work, we will use this fact to describe nerves for dependent type theories, and to study the coherence problem for dependent type theory using the tools of two-dimensional monad theory. © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.