chore: simplify docstring for propext (#9593)

This PR simplifies the docstring for `propext` significantly.

The old docstring explained general concepts of axioms that are now
covered in the reference manual, and had a large example that was out of
date and has been subsumed by reference manual content.
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David Thrane Christiansen 2025-07-29 05:51:34 +02:00 committed by GitHub
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@ -1536,38 +1536,13 @@ end Setoid
/-! # Propositional extensionality -/
/--
The axiom of **propositional extensionality**. It asserts that if propositions
`a` and `b` are logically equivalent (i.e. we can prove `a` from `b` and vice versa),
then `a` and `b` are *equal*, meaning that we can replace `a` with `b` in all
contexts.
The [axiom](lean-manual://section/axioms) of **propositional extensionality**. It asserts that if
propositions `a` and `b` are logically equivalent (that is, if `a` can be proved from `b` and vice
versa), then `a` and `b` are *equal*, meaning `a` can be replaced with `b` in all contexts.
For simple expressions like `a ∧ c d → e` we can prove that because all the logical
connectives respect logical equivalence, we can replace `a` with `b` in this expression
without using `propext`. However, for higher order expressions like `P a` where
`P : Prop → Prop` is unknown, or indeed for `a = b` itself, we cannot replace `a` with `b`
without an axiom which says exactly this.
This is a relatively uncontroversial axiom, which is intuitionistically valid.
It does however block computation when using `#reduce` to reduce proofs directly
(which is not recommended), meaning that canonicity,
the property that all closed terms of type `Nat` normalize to numerals,
fails to hold when this (or any) axiom is used:
```
set_option pp.proofs true
def foo : Nat := by
have : (True → True) ↔ True := ⟨λ _ => trivial, λ _ _ => trivial⟩
have := propext this ▸ (2 : Nat)
exact this
#reduce foo
-- propext { mp := fun x x => True.intro, mpr := fun x => True.intro } ▸ 2
#eval foo -- 2
```
`#eval` can evaluate it to a numeral because the compiler erases casts and
does not evaluate proofs, so `propext`, whose return type is a proposition,
can never block it.
The standard logical connectives provably respect propositional extensionality. However, an axiom is
needed for higher order expressions like `P a` where `P : Prop → Prop` is unknown, as well as for
equality. Propositional extensionality is intuitionistically valid.
-/
axiom propext {a b : Prop} : (a ↔ b) → a = b