Existentially closed models and locally zero-dimensional toposes

Abstract

The notion of an existentially closed model is generalised to a property of geometric morphisms between toposes. We show that important properties of existentially closed models extend to existentially closed geometric morphisms, such as the fact that every model admits a homomorphism to an existentially closed one. Other properties do not generalise: classically, there are two equivalent definitions of an existentially closed model, but this equivalence breaks down for the generalised notion. We study the interaction of these two conditions on the topos-theoretic level, and characterise the classifying topos of the e.c. geometric morphisms when the conditions coincide.