-A \emph{monoid} is a slighly simpler thing than a group. It has multiplication and identity, but it might not have inverses. This means that there are loads more monoids than groups, and that monoids are (a) simpler to work with but (b) much harder to classify (but this is OK, we don't want to classify them). The axioms for a monoid are the axioms for a group which don't mention inverses: they are $a\times(b\times c)=(a\times b)\times c$ and $1\times a=a\times 1=a$. The inverse axioms aren't there because they don't make sense. The naturals, integers, rationals, reals and complexes are all monoids under multiplication; they all have a 0 and 0 doesn't have an inverse, but this doesn't matter because monoids don't need inverses. A group is a monoid with some extra stuff (inverses), so a group variety is a monoid variety with extra stuff, so let's first discuss how to formalise monoid varieties. And this is easier than you think because the hard work (the key definition) has already been done.
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