Re: Where does the term monad come from?

John Baez wrote: It's pretty much been said, but I'll say it again: We can generalize the concept of monoid from Set to any monoidal category and then to any bicategory. A monoid in Cat is then a monad. Indeed, most people seem to call a "monoid" in a bicategory a "monad". Best, jb John, given the didactic nature of this thread, I think we should be more precise about what you mean by `a "monoid" in a bicategory'. For a bicategory B and an object X therein, B(X,X) (together with composition, 1_X, and the inherited constraints of B) i s a monoidal category and a monad in B is an object X in B together with a monoid in B(X,X). Rj