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ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2009/iii/paper-23/3/b/solution
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2009 iii Paper 23 3 b Solution by
Codex 0 Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
A Cartesian closed category has finite categorical products and, for every , an exponential object with an evaluation morphism such that composition with evaluation gives natural bijectionsFinite categorical products in the presheaf category are pointwise; in particular its terminal object is the constant singleton categorical presheaf. For categorical presheaves defineFor , restriction sends to . Composition and identity laws follow from those of the Yoneda embedding, so this is a categorical presheaf.
Define evaluation at by . For , naturality of gives , which is the evaluation of the restricted pair. Hence evaluation is a natural transformation.
Given , its currying sends to the transformation whose component at isNaturality in follows from that of , and naturality in follows by composing with the relevant arrow. Evaluating at recovers . Conversely, if , naturality of along says that evaluating at gives . Thus currying the evaluation of recovers . These constructions are inverse and natural, proving the universal property. This is the exponential in a presheaf category, and proves the presheaf category is Cartesian closed.
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