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For example, the initial object in any concrete category with free objects will be the free object generated by the empty set (since the free functor, being left adjoint to the forgetful functor to Set, preserves colimits). Initial and terminal objects may also be characterized in terms of universal properties and adjoint functors.
The terminal object is the terminal category or trivial category 1 with a single object and morphism. [2] The category Cat is itself a large category, and therefore not an object of itself. In order to avoid problems analogous to Russell's paradox one cannot form the “category of all categories”. But it is possible to form a quasicategory ...
Examples of limits and colimits in Top include: The empty set (considered as a topological space) is the initial object of Top; any singleton topological space is a terminal object. There are thus no zero objects in Top. The product in Top is given by the product topology on the Cartesian product.
Every set is a projective object in Set (assuming the axiom of choice). The finitely presentable objects in Set are the finite sets. Since every set is a direct limit of its finite subsets, the category Set is a locally finitely presentable category. If C is an arbitrary category, the contravariant functors from C to Set are often an important ...
Another example: An empty product (that is, is the empty set) is the same as a terminal object, and some categories, such as the category of infinite groups, do not have a terminal object: given any infinite group there are infinitely many morphisms , so cannot be terminal.
Examples of limits and colimits in Ring include: The ring of integers Z is an initial object in Ring. The zero ring is a terminal object in Ring. The product in Ring is given by the direct product of rings. This is just the cartesian product of the underlying sets with addition and multiplication defined component-wise.
A cone to an object X is just a morphism with codomain X. A morphism f : Y → X is a limit of the diagram X if and only if f is an isomorphism. More generally, if J is any category with an initial object i, then any diagram of shape J has a limit, namely any object isomorphic to F(i). Such an isomorphism uniquely determines a universal cone to F.
Universal morphisms can also be thought more abstractly as initial or terminal objects of a comma category (see § Connection with comma categories, below). Universal properties occur almost everywhere in mathematics, and the use of the concept allows the use of general properties of universal properties for easily proving some properties that ...