this paper we provide a uniform approach to modelling them in categories of modest sets. To do this, we identify appropriate structure for doing "domain theory" in such "realizability models". In Sections 2 and 3 we introduce PCAs and define the associated "realizability" categories of assemblies and modest sets. Next, in Section 4, we prepare for our development of domain theory with an analysis of nontermination. Previous approaches have used (relatively complicated) categorical formulations of partial maps for this purpose. Instead, motivated by the idea that A provides a primitive programming language, we consider a simple notion of "diverging" computation within A itself. This leads to a theory of divergences from which a notion of (computable) partial function is derived together with a lift monad classifying partial functions. The next task is to isolate a subcategory of modest sets with sufficient structure for supporting analogues of the usual domain-theoretic constructions. First, we expect to be able to interpret the standard constructions of total type theory in this category, so it should inherit cartesian-closure, coproducts and the natural numbers from modest sets. Second, it should interact well with the notion of partiality, so it should be closed under application of the lift functor. Third, it should allow the recursive definition of partial functions. This is achieved by obtaining a fixpoint object in the category, as defined in (Crole and Pitts 1992). Finally, although there is in principle no definitive list of requirements on such a category, one would like it to support more complicated constructions such as those required to interpret polymorphic and recursive types. The central part of the paper (Sections 5, 6, 7 and 9) is devoted to establish...

This paper provides a unifying axiomatic account of the interpretation of recursive types that incorporates both domain-theoretic and realizability models as concrete instances. Our approach is to view such models as full subcategories of categorical models of intuitionistic set theory. It is shown that the existence of solutions to recursive domain equations depends upon the strength of the set theory. We observe that the internal set theory of an elementary topos is not strong enough to guarantee their existence. In contrast, as our first main result, we establish that solutions to recursive domain equations do exist when the category of sets is a model of full intuitionistic Zermelo-Fraenkel set theory. We then apply this result to obtain a denotational interpretation of FPC, a recursively typed lambda-calculus with callby-value operational semantics. By exploiting the intuitionistic logic of the ambient model of intuitionistic set theory, we analyse the relationship between operational and denotational semantics. We first prove an “internal ” computational adequacy theorem: the model always believes that the operational and denotational notions of termination agree. This allows us to identify, as our second main result, a necessary and sufficient condition for genuine “external ” computational adequacy to hold, i.e. for the operational and denotational notions of termination to coincide in the real world. The condition is formulated as a simple property of the internal logic, related to the logical notion of 1-consistency. We provide useful sufficient conditions for establishing that the logical property holds in practice. Finally, we outline how the methods of the paper may be applied to concrete models of FPC. In doing so, we obtain computational adequacy results for an extensive range of realizability and domain-theoretic models.