Baizhanov and Baldwin [1] introduce the notions of benign and weakly benign sets to investigate the preservation of stability by naming arbitrary subsets of a stable structure. They connect the notion with work of Baldwin, Benedikt, Bouscaren, Casanovas, Poizat, and Ziegler. Stimulated by [1], we investigate here the existence of benign or weakly benign sets.
Definition 0.1. (1) The set A is benign in M if for every α, β ∊ M if p = tp(α/A) = tp(β/A) then tp*(α/A) = tp*(β/A) where the *-type is the type in the language L* with a new predicate P denoting A.
(2) The set A is weakly benign in M if for every α,β ∊ M if p = stp(α/A) = stp(β/A) then tp*(α/A) = tp*(β/A) where the *-type is the type in language with a new predicate P denoting A.
Conjecture 0.2 (too optimistic). If M is a model of stable theory T and A ⊆ M then A is benign.
Shelah observed, after learning of the Baizhanov-Baldwin reductions of the problem to equivalence relations, the following counterexample.
Lemma 0.3. There is an ω-stable rank 2 theory T with ndop which has a model M and set A such that A is not benign in M.