Incompleteness along paths in progressions of theories

Abstract

We deal in the following with certain theories S, by which we mean sets of sentences closed under logical deduction. The basic logic is understood to be the classical one, but we place no restriction on the orders of the variables to be used. However, we do assume that we can at least express certain notions from classical first-order number theory within these theories. In particular, there should correspond to each primitive recursive function ξ a formula φ(χ), where ‘x’ is a variable ranging over natural numbers, such that for each numeral ñ, φ(ñ) expresses in the language of S that ξ(η) = 0. Such formulas, when obtained say by the Gödel method of eliminating primitive recursive definitions in favor of arithmetical definitions in +. ·. are called PR-formulas (cf. [1] §2 (C)).