Examples concerning absolute flatness and amalgamation in pomonoids

Abstract

Flatness properties of acts over monoids have been studied for almost four decades and a substantial literature is now available on the subject. Analogous research dealing with partially ordered monoids acting on posets was begun in the 1980s in two papers by S.M. Fakhruddin, and, after a dormancy period of some 20 years, has recently been rekindled with the appearance of several research articles. In comparing flatness properties of S-acts and S-posets, it has been noted that the imposition of order results in severe restrictions as far as absolute flatness is concerned. For example, whereas every inverse monoid is absolutely flat (meaning all of its left and right acts are flat), even the three-element chain in its natural order, considered as a pomonoid, fails to have this property. It has long been understood that absolutely flat monoids, in particular, inverse monoids, are amalgamation bases in the class of all monoids. The purpose of the present article is to further investigate absolute flatness of pomonoids and to begin to study its connection with amalgamation in that context. T.E. Hall’s results, that amalgamation bases in the class of all monoids have the so-called representation extension property (REP), which in turn implies the right congruence extension property, are first adapted to the ordered context. A detailed study of the compatible orders (of which there are exactly 13) on the three-element chain semilattice U then reveals a wide range of possibilities: exactly four of these orders render U absolutely flat as a pomonoid, two more give it the right order-congruence extension property in every extension (RCEP) (but fail to make it an amalgamation base because of the failure of the ordered analogue of (REP)), and for the remaining seven, even (RCEP) fails.