Assume . For every pair of rationals , Doob upcrossing inequality gives
by monotone convergence theorem. Thus every rational interval is upcrossed only finitely often almost surely. If a real sequence has distinct limit inferior and limit superior, it completes infinitely many upcrossings of some rational interval between them. Hence converges in the extended real line almost surely.
Fatou lemma gives
so the limit is finite almost surely and integrable. This is the -bounded form of the martingale convergence theorem.
Choose with . Every tail of a sequence is nonempty and bounded, so its supremum exists and lies in . Removing one term cannot increase a supremum, hence . The bounded monotone sequence theorem, applied to , proves
Thus is the limit superior of .
For , eventually , and then . Only finitely many indices can satisfy . If only finitely many satisfied , some entire tail of a sequence would have . Its supremum would also be at most , contradicting .
Inductively choose so late that and . There are infinitely many choices for the latter inequality, so both requirements can be met. Then , proving . This constructs a subsequence attaining the limit superior.
At the nonzero indices with ,
since . At all other sufficiently large indices the coefficient is zero. The initial coefficients do not affect the limit superior, which equals one. The Cauchy-Hadamard theorem therefore gives .
The Cauchy-Hadamard theorem states . At the prime numbers , this root equals . There are infinitely many prime numbers, so these indices form an unbounded subsequence. For every other positive index the root is zero. The limit superior is therefore one, and .
The functions are nonnegative. The change of variables and the given Gaussian integral imply
For every fixed ,
Thus the mass concentrates at the endpoint zero. This is a one-sided approximate identity.
Because is continuous on the compact interval , it is a bounded function; put . Given , choose with for . Splitting the integral near and away from zero yields
Taking the limit superior gives a bound of , and was arbitrary. Consequently
Only continuity at zero and boundedness on were needed for this final estimate; the assumed continuity everywhere also guarantees the ordinary integrals exist.
For , fix signs . The constraints leave exactly two choices for the signs : choose freely, then set and for . Each input tuple has probability by independence. Consequently
Every finite subfamily is a marginal distribution of one such initial segment, so the entire sequence is independent, with fair sign probability distributions.
Using the usual everywhere sign-valued representatives, for every we have
The right side is measurable with respect to . Therefore is measurable with respect to their intersection .
Write . The Kolmogorov zero-one law applies to the independent random variables , so every event has probability zero or one. Also is independent of : this follows first for finite intersections of sign events from the given independence, then for their generated sigma-algebra by part (a).
The sets with and form a pi-system generating . If , the event has probability zero and is independent of every event in . If , it differs from by a null set, so the same independence follows from that of and . Another application of part (a) proves
In particular cannot contain the nontrivial event , whereas does. Thus adjoining a sigma-algebra need not commute with a decreasing intersection.
There is a small version qualification if the assumptions specify only the probability distributions, allowing exceptional values other than signs. Put when the denominator is nonzero, and otherwise. For , is measurable with respect to . The limit superior of , after scalar clipping to , is therefore -measurable and equals almost surely. Literal measurability of an arbitrary version of need not follow without choosing sign-valued representatives or adjoining the ambient null sets. All the independence conclusions are unaffected.
Apply part (i) for every positive integer and discard the countable union of its exceptional null sets. A sample path bounded below never reaches for some such , and must therefore converge to a finite limit of a sequence.
Apply the same argument to the martingale . Outside one more null set, every sample path bounded above also converges finitely. Thus a sample path which does not converge finitely must be unbounded in both directions. Each finite initial segment has finite values, so removing any such segment preserves unboundedness. It follows that the limit superior is and the limit inferior is . Consequently
This proves the bounded-increment martingale convergence-or-oscillation dichotomy; in particular one-sided divergence to infinity is impossible with positive probability.
We prove the Doob-Dynkin lemma here by simple function approximation. Choose such that everywhere, and let
Each is a finite-valued -measurable function and pointwise. Write its level sets as , with associated values . By part (i), choose Borel sets with . Define the Borel measurable functions
Although the chosen need not partition all of , their inverse images do partition , so exactly.
Apply scalar clipping to each with bounds , preserving this equality, and define . A bounded limit superior of Borel measurable functions is a finite Borel measurable function. At every the limit of a sequence exists and gives
Thus the factorization is exact for a bounded, exactly -measurable function. If hypotheses are instead given only up to null sets, the corresponding conclusion is a factorization holding almost surely after choosing a representative.
For a fixed finite number of nonnegative terms and , use . The logarithm of , divided by the large-deviation speed, tends to zero, and a finite maximum commutes with the limit superior. If all individual logarithmic limits exist, the limit of the sum is their maximum.
Root-moment bound for open self-avoiding walks Created 2026-10-06 Updated 2026-10-07
In independent bond percolation on a graph, let be the number of -step self-avoiding walks from a fixed graph vertex and the number that are open. Then . The Jensen inequality for the concave function gives . No independence between different self-avoiding walk indicators is needed. When , the limit superior is at most .
Include the positive integers in , and exclude the intervening integer intervals and zero. Equivalently, include for . Each included block is large enough to raise the running proportion; the following excluded block lowers it again.
With , the exact boundary counts follow from a geometric series:
The first sum is empty at . Dividing by the corresponding boundary, rather than using one denominator for both, gives
For example, , whereas , yielding proportions and . For , the exact count is ; for it stays . Hence the proportion increases through each included block and decreases through each excluded block. These boundary subsequences give the actual limit inferior and limit superior:
Since these differ, has no natural density. Its upper asymptotic density still records its largest limiting proportion.
Suppose is a sublinear functional on the bounded real sequences, dominated by the limit superior and nonpositive on every shift difference . The Hahn-Banach theorem then yields a Banach limit. Indeed implies , so agrees with the ordinary limit on convergent sequences. Extend this linear limit functional by Hahn-Banach to a linear . Domination on and on its negative forces . The two-sided limit bounds give positivity, norm one and agreement with ordinary limits. In finite-shift averaging constructions, the needed bound on shift differences follows by telescoping consecutive averages to .
Define a sequence by when is a power of two, including , and otherwise. Every tail of a sequence contains both a later power of two and a later nonpower. Therefore and , and the sequence does not converge. Its peak indices become increasingly sparse, yet never stop appearing.
Through index , the number of peaks is , so their fraction is
The set of powers of two has natural density zero. The same fraction is the Cesàro mean of the first terms, which tends to zero even though the limit superior stays one. At , eleven peaks give mean . An average and a long-run upper edge answer different questions about the same sequence.
Figure 1.
Peaks of zero natural density retain a limit superior of one while their Cesàro means tend to zero
. Left: the indicator sequence has peaks at powers of two; every sufficiently late tail still contains peaks and zeros. Right: the exact peak count divided by decreases overall toward zero, with jumps when a new power of two enters the count. These finite plots illustrate formulas valid at every positive integer index. Details.
Subsequential limit Created 2026-10-14 Updated 2026-10-25
A subsequential limit of a sequence is a value approached by some subsequence with strictly increasing indices . For , the subsequences at even integers and odd integers give subsequential limits one and minus one. A finite value appearing among only finitely many initial terms does not become a subsequential limit merely by being a member of the image of a function represented by the sequence.
For a bounded sequence of real numbers, its subsequential limits form a nonempty bounded set that is also a closed set. The Bolzano-Weierstrass theorem guarantees nonemptiness, and its extreme values are the limit inferior and limit superior. The sequence in sparse peaks can determine a limit superior has the two subsequential limits zero and one, despite almost all indices in the natural density sense carrying zero.
Tail measurability of limits of sample averages Created 2026-10-05 Updated 2026-10-14
Let be a sequence of finite real random variables, and write for its sample mean. For fixed and , put . Then, at each outcome,
Consequently . The right-hand limit superior is a measurable function of for every , so the extended-real random variable is measurable with respect to the tail sigma-algebra. The same holds for the limit inferior. Thus the event of convergence to a finite limit of a sequence, and the event for any specified real , are tail events.
For a worked deterministic example, let alternate , and replace its first three entries by . For every the two sample means differ by exactly , so both converge to . Finite edits can change small-sample answers while preserving the infinite limit of a sequence.
Under independence, Kolmogorov's zero–one law makes each specified convergence event have probability zero or one. It does not select which value occurs. If a finite random variable measurable with respect to the tail sigma-algebra exists, the events for rational each have probability zero or one; continuity of probability and their nesting force to be constant almost surely. For fair independent Bernoulli trials, the strong law of large numbers establishes almost surely; the zero–one conclusion alone proves neither convergence nor the value .
Upper asymptotic density Created 2026-10-06 Updated 2026-10-14
For a subset of the positive integers, its upper asymptotic density is
The limit superior keeps the largest limiting proportion even when the running proportions oscillate. Because they lie in , this limit superior always exists in . If natural density exists, upper asymptotic density equals it.
The convention here uses , while natural density above uses . Replacing one interval by the other changes a count by at most one, so the proportions differ by at most and have the same limit superior. For the set without natural density above, the count in is six rather than five, because is included and zero is absent. Nevertheless its upper asymptotic density is exactly . The even positive integers have upper asymptotic density and the prime numbers have upper asymptotic density zero.
The useful feature is that a large proportion along arbitrarily large initial integer intervals already supplies structure. The Szemerédi theorem says that positive upper asymptotic density forces arithmetic progressions of every finite length, with positive common difference, even without an existing natural density. Szemerédi's 1975 paper resolved this general finite-length problem; it makes density a bridge from counting to additive structure. [ref]