Work with a probability measure-preserving system, so . Put
The maximal ergodic theorem, also called the maximal ergodic lemma, says that for real ,
No ergodic transformation or invertibility assumption is needed for this maximal ergodic lemma.
Here is a proof of the maximal ergodic lemma. Set and . These are integrable: . Splitting off the first summand gives
On , this implies . Outside the right side is . Consequently
Integrating and using the measure-preserving transformation property gives . Since increases to , the dominated convergence theorem, with dominating function , proves the infinite-supremum assertion of the maximal ergodic lemma.
For example, applying the maximal ergodic lemma to yields the useful maximal bound
Indeed on the latter set , the maximal ergodic lemma gives .
The pointwise ergodic theorem states that for a probability measure-preserving system and ,
where is the invariant sigma-algebra. The conditional expectation is invariant and has integral . If is an ergodic transformation, this conditional expectation is the constant . The assertion applies to real or complex integrable functions; it is the Birkhoff ergodic theorem.
For a nonnegative measurable , if , the pointwise ergodic theorem already proves the required conclusion. For the remaining case, let , . Each is integrable on the probability measure-preserving system. The pointwise ergodic theorem and ergodic transformation property give, on a single set of full measure obtained by a countable intersection,
Since , every such satisfies for all . The monotone convergence theorem gives . Thus the nonnegative ergodic averages with infinite integral tend to , rather than merely having an unbounded subsequence. Combining the two cases,
Nonnegativity is what makes truncation a lower bound. The probability normalization is also essential to the displayed value: for a finite measure of total mass , the corresponding constant is .
The Birkhoff ergodic theorem states: for a measure-preserving transformation of a finite measure space and , the averages converge almost everywhere and in to an invariant function . On a probability space,
where is the invariant sigma-algebra modulo null sets. In particular the integral is preserved, and if is ergodic then almost everywhere; for a finite space of nonunit mass, this constant is when .
The maximal ergodic lemma says that for real integrable , with and ,
The same inequality holds on , by taking the increasing limit and dominated convergence. These statements do not require the transformation to be invertible or the space to be ergodic.