Cyclic proofs for arithmetical inductive definitions

Abstract: We investigate the cyclic proof theory of extensions of Peano Arithmetic by (finitely iterated) inductive definitions. Such theories are essential to proof theoretic analyses of certain `impredicative' theories; moreover, our cyclic systems naturally subsume Simpson's Cyclic Arithmetic. Our main result is that cyclic and inductive systems for arithmetical inductive definitions are equally powerful. We conduct a metamathematical argument, formalising the soundness of cyclic proofs within second-order arithmetic by a form of induction on closure ordinals, thence appealing to conservativity results. This approach is inspired by those of Simpson and Das for Cyclic Arithmetic, however we must further address a difficulty: the closure ordinals of our inductive definitions (around Church-Kleene) far exceed the proof theoretic ordinal of the appropriate metatheory (around Bachmann-Howard), so explicit induction on their notations is not possible. For this reason, we rather rely on formalisation of the theory of (recursive) ordinals within second-order arithmetic.