Let be a measure-preserving transformation of and let . The Birkhoff ergodic theorem states that
almost everywhere, where is the invariant sigma-algebra. The limit is -invariant and
Assume now that . For , let
be the bounded truncation of , and let be its Birkhoff limit. Since on a finite measure space, the dominated convergence theorem gives
Measure preservation and the triangle inequality give the contraction
Moreover, the almost-everywhere convergence and Fatou lemma imply
Consequently
Since in , letting proves the L1 convergence in the Birkhoff ergodic theorem on a finite measure space: