What is the category of functors from C to D?
Conditions
- and are categories.
Reasoning, step by step
- Identify the source category and target category .
- Collect all functors mapping from to to serve as the objects of the new category.
- Identify all natural transformations between pairs of these functors to serve as the morphisms.
- Define the composition of morphisms in this new category (which is done componentwise).
- Conclude that this structure forms the functor category .
Example
The speaker says, "Suppose we wanted to define the category , that is, the category of functors from to ." The symbol is displayed on screen, and the diagram shows functors , , and as objects, with natural transformations and as morphisms between them.
Common misconceptions
- Thinking the objects of are the objects of or ; they are the functors themselves.
- Assuming the morphisms are arbitrary mappings between functors; they must specifically be natural transformations.
- Confusing the functor category with the product category .
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Related questions
A diagram is said to commute if any two directed paths between the same pair of objects yield equal composite morphisms. In the context of natural transformations, this means that the composition of morphisms along one route in the square (e.g., followed by ) is exactly equal to the composition along the alternative route (e.g., followed by ).
Conditions: Applies to diagrams formed by morphisms in a category.; The paths must start at the same object and end at the same object.
The diagram must commute to ensure that the natural transformation is structurally consistent with the functors and the categories they connect. Specifically, it guarantees that transforming an object via and then applying the functor to a morphism yields the same result as applying the functor to the morphism first and then transforming via .
Conditions: is a morphism in from object to object .; and are functors from to .; and are components of the natural transformation .
A natural transformation between functors and is defined by assigning a morphism in the target category for each object in the source category , such that for every morphism in , the corresponding square commutes ().
Conditions: and are functors from to .; and are objects in .; is a morphism from to in .
The composition of two natural transformations and is defined componentwise. For each object in the source category , the -component of the composite transformation is the composite morphism in the target category .
Conditions: is a natural transformation from to .; is a natural transformation from to .; is an object in .
A natural transformation between two functors and (both mapping from category to category ) is a rule that assigns to every object in a morphism in , specifically from to . This morphism is called the component of the natural transformation at object .
Conditions: and are functors from category to category .; For each object in , is a morphism in from to .; For every morphism in , the commutative square condition must hold.
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