Martin's Maximum and tower forcing

Abstract

There are several examples in the literature showing that compactness-like properties of a cardinal $κ$ cause poor behavior of some generic ultrapowers which have critical point $κ$ (Burke \cite{MR1472122} when $κ$ is a supercompact cardinal; Foreman-Magidor \cite{MR1359154} when $κ= ω_2$ in the presence of strong forcing axioms). We prove more instances of this phenomenon. First, the Reflection Principle (RP) implies that if $\vec{\mathcal{I}}$ is a tower of ideals which concentrates on the class $GIC_{ω_1}$ of $ω_1$-guessing, internally club sets, then $\vec{\mathcal{I}}$ is not presaturated (a set is $ω_1$-guessing iff its transitive collapse has the $ω_1$-approximation property as defined in Hamkins \cite{MR2540935}). This theorem, combined with work from \cite{VW_ISP}, shows that if $PFA^+$ or $MM$ holds and there is an inaccessible cardinal, then there is a tower with critical point $ω_2$ which is not presaturated; moreover this tower is significantly different from the non-presaturated tower already known (by Foreman-Magidor \cite{MR1359154}) to exist in all models of Martin's Maximum. The conjunction of the Strong Reflection Principle (SRP) and the Tree Property at $ω_2$ has similar implications for towers of ideals which concentrate on the wider class $GIS_{ω_1}$ of $ω_1$-guessing, internally stationary sets. Finally, we show that the word "presaturated" cannot be replaced by "precipitous" in the theorems above: Martin's Maximum (which implies SRP and the Tree Property at $ω_2$) is consistent with a precipitous tower on $GIC_{ω_1}$.