We develop the theory of generically stable types, independence relation based on nonforking and stable weight in the context of dependent theories.

A ternary relation [Formula: see text] between subsets of the big model of a complete first-order theory T is called an independence relation if it satisfies a certain set of axioms. The primary example is forking in a simple theory, but o-minimal theories are also known to have an interesting independence relation. Our approach in this paper is to treat independence relations as mathematical objects worth studying. The main application is a better understanding of thorn-forking, which turns out to be (...) closely related to modular pairs in the lattice of algebraically closed sets. (shrink)

We give a characterization for those stable theories whose $\omega_{1}$-saturated models have a "Shelah-style" structure theorem. We use this characterization to prove that if a theory is countable, stable, and 1-based without dop or didip, then its $\omega_{1}$-saturated models have a structure theorem. Prior to us, this is proved in a paper of Hart, Pillay, and Starchenko . Some other remarks are also included.

We study the behaviour of stable types in rosy theories. The main technical result is that a non-þ-forking extension of an unstable type is unstable. We apply this to show that a rosy group with a þ-generic stable type is stable. In the context of super-rosy theories of finite rank we conclude that non-trivial stable types of U þ -rank 1 must arise from definable stable sets.