Pure Math Department Colloquium

Andy Zucker, University of Waterloo

Minimal dynamics of topological groups: A set-theoretic perspective

This talk explores the minimal actions of topological groups on compact spaces. By a classical result of Ellis, every topological group admits a largest such action called the universal minimal flow. Here, we take a set-theoretic perspective and ask how the universal minimal flow can change when considering different models of set theory. In particular, we will take the opportunity to give a gentle introduction to set-theoretic forcing. Our main result is a characterization of those topological groups for which the universal minimal flow is absolute. Joint work with Gianluca Basso.

MC 5501