Univalence without function extensionality

It is a well-known theorem of homotopy type theory, originally due to Voevodsky, that function extensionality holds inside any univalent universe. We consider a weaker variant of the univalence axiom, asserting that the wild category formed by the universe is univalent, which we call categorical univalence. We show that categorical univalence does not imply function extensionality by an analysis of Von Glehn's polynomial model construction, which produces models of Martin-Löf type theory that always refute function extensionality. We find in particular that when the base model has a univalent universe, its polynomial model has a universe that is categorically univalent but lacks function extensionality.

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Publication Details

Journal
Electronic Notes in Theoretical Informatics and Computer Science
Published
2026-11-04
DOI
https://doi.org/10.46298/entics.19622
Primary Topic
Logic, programming, and type systems
Type
article
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article

Univalence without function extensionality

Evan Cavallo, Jonas Höfer
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Electronic Notes in Theoretical Informatics and Computer Science
Logic, programming, and type systems
article

Univalence without function extensionality

Evan Cavallo, Jonas Höfer
article en

Abstract

It is a well-known theorem of homotopy type theory, originally due to Voevodsky, that function extensionality holds inside any univalent universe. We consider a weaker variant of the univalence axiom, asserting that the wild category formed by the universe is univalent, which we call categorical univalence. We show that categorical univalence does not imply function extensionality by an analysis of Von Glehn's polynomial model construction, which produces models of Martin-Löf type theory that always refute function extensionality. We find in particular that when the base model has a univalent universe, its polynomial model has a universe that is categorically univalent but lacks function extensionality.

Electronic Notes in Theoretical Informatics and Computer ScienceVol. Volume 6: Proceedings of MFPS...
Openalex Percentile: Top 76%
Logic, programming, and type systems
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