Order coordinatewise. The statement means
for every real-valued order-preserving function ; equivalently, for every increasing event . This is stochastic domination of probability measures. For strictly positive laws, the Holley condition is the sufficient condition
Here join and meet are coordinatewise maximum and minimum. The Holley inequality states that this condition implies the stated stochastic domination.
For a single positive law, the FKG lattice condition is
We prove that it gives positive association of random variables, namely for all increasing . Fix such a , and for form the strictly positive tilted law
The lattice condition and imply
Thus the Holley condition applies to , and . Equality holds at , so the right derivative there is nonnegative. Differentiating the finite sums gives
Hence
which proves the requested positive association of random variables. Neither nor needs to be nonnegative; the finite space makes all differentiations justified. This is the exponential-tilt proof of positive association.