We give a generator-free formulation of sofic measure entropy using finite partitions and establish a Kolmogorov-Sinai theorem. We also show how to compute the values for general Bernoulli actions in a concise way using the arguments of Bowen in the finite base case.
We prove that for a measure preserving action of a sofic group with positive sofic entropy, the set of points with finite stabilizer have positive measure. This extends results of Weiss and Seward for amenable groups and free groups, respectively. It follows that the action of a sofic group on its subgroups by inner automorphisms has zero topological sofic entropy, and a faithful action with completely positive sofic entropy must be free.
In this work, we study pmp actions of countable groups on arbitrary diffuse probability spaces under the point of view of weak equivalence. We will show that any such an action is weakly equivalent to an action on a standard probability space. We also propose a metric on the space of actions modulo weak equivalence which is equivalent to the topology of Abért and Elek. We will give a simpler proof of the compactness of the space, showing that convergence is characterized by ultraproducts. Using this topology, we will show that a profinite action is weakly equivalent to an ultraproduct of finit…
In previous work, I introduced a measure-conjugacy invariant for sofic group actions called sofic entropy. Here it is proven that the sofic entropy of an amenable group action equals its classical entropy. The proof uses a new measure-conjugacy invariant called upper-sofic entropy and a theorem of Rudolph and Weiss for the entropy of orbit-equivalent actions relative to the orbit change $σ$-algebra.
Sofic entropy theory is a generalization of the classical Kolmogorov-Sinai entropy theory to actions of large class of non-amenable groups called sofic groups. This is a short introduction with a guide to the literature.
In a previous paper the authors developed an operator-algebraic approach to Lewis Bowen's sofic measure entropy that yields invariants for actions of countable sofic groups by homeomorphisms on a compact metrizable space and by measure-preserving transformations on a standard probability space. We show here that these measure and topological entropy invariants both coincide with their classical counterparts when the acting group is amenable.
The entropy in dynamical systems was introduced by A. Kolmogorov. Initially dedicated to iterations of one finite measure preserving transformation, the notion was gradually generalized so as to encompass amenable group actions and topological actions. L. Bowen (2008) succeeded in breaking the non-amenable frontier by introducing the sofic entropy. This invariant provides the same services as the classical entropy for the measured actions of the sofic groups (a class which contains the residually finite groups). In 2010, D. Kerr et H. Li established a topological version together with a variat…
We prove that if two topologically free and entropy regular actions of countable sofic groups on compact metrizable spaces are continuously orbit equivalent, and each group either (i) contains a w-normal amenable subgroup which is neither locally finite nor virtually cyclic, or (ii) is a non-locally-finite product of two infinite groups, then the actions have the same sofic topological entropy. This fact is then used to show that if two free uniquely ergodic and entropy regular probability-measure-preserving actions of such groups are boundedly orbit equivalent then the actions have the same s…
Let $G$ be a countable discrete sofic group. We define a concept of uniform mixing for measure-preserving $G$-actions and show that it implies completely positive sofic entropy. When $G$ contains an element of infinite order, we use this to produce an uncountable family of pairwise nonisomorphic $G$-actions with completely positive sofic entropy. None of our examples is a factor of a Bernoulli shift.
In 1987, Ornstein and Weiss discovered that the Bernoulli $2$-shift over the rank two free group factors onto the seemingly larger Bernoulli $4$-shift. With the recent creation of an entropy theory for actions of sofic groups (in particular free groups), their example shows the surprising fact that entropy can increase under factor maps. In order to better understand this phenomenon, we study a natural generalization of the Ornstein--Weiss map for countable groups. We relate the increase in entropy to the cost and to the first $\ell^2$-Betti number of the group. More generally, we study coboun…
This is the first part in a series in which sofic entropy theory is generalized to class-bijective extensions of sofic groupoids. Here we define topological and measure entropy and prove invariance. We also establish the variational principle, compute the entropy of Bernoulli shift actions and answer a question of Benjy Weiss pertaining to the isomorphism problem for non-free Bernoulli shifts. The proofs are independent of previous literature.
Recently Lewis Bowen introduced a notion of entropy for measure-preserving actions of countable sofic groups admitting a generating measurable partition with finite entropy; and then David Kerr and Hanfeng Li developed an operator-algebraic approach to actions of countable sofic groups not only on a standard probability space but also on a compact metric space, and established the global variational principle concerning measure-theoretic and topological entropy in this sofic context. By localizing these two kinds of entropy, in this paper we prove a local version of the global variational prin…
We prove the explicit formula for sofic and Rokhlin entropy of actions arising from some class of Gibbs measures. It provides a new set of examples with sofic entropy independent of sofic approximations. It is particularilly interresting, since in non-amenable case Rokhlin entropy was computed only in case of Bernoulli actions and for some examples with zero Rokhlin entropy. As an example we show that our formula holds for the supercritical Ising model. We also establish a criterion for uniqueness of Gibbs measure by means of f-invariant.
Let G be a sofic group and X a compact group that G acts on by automorphisms. Using (and reformulating) the notion of doubly-quenched convergence developed by Austin, we show that in many cases the topological and the measure-theoretic entropy with respect to the Haar measure of this action agree. Our method of proof recovers all known examples. Moreover, the proofs are direct and do not go through explicitly computing the measure-theoretic or topological entropy.
Sofic entropy is an invariant for probability-preserving actions of sofic groups. It was introduced a few years ago by Lewis Bowen, and shown to extend the classical Kolmogorov-Sinai entropy from the setting of amenable groups. Some parts of Kolmogorov-Sinai entropy theory generalize to sofic entropy, but in other respects this new invariant behaves less regularly. This paper explores conditions under which sofic entropy is additive for Cartesian products of systems. It is always subadditive, but the reverse inequality can fail. We define a new entropy-notion in terms of probability distributi…
Let $Γ$ be a sofic group with a copy of $\mathbb{Z}$ in its center. We construct an uncountable family of pairwise nonisomorphic measure-preserving $Γ$ actions with completely positive entropy, none of which is a factor of a Bernoulli shift. Our construction shows that the relation of isomorphism among completely positive entropy $Γ$ actions is not smooth, in contrast with the relation of isomorphism among Bernoulli shifts.
For actions of a sofic group on probability spaces, the entropy has been defined by Bowen, with an extension by Kerr-Li. In particular, when the action is by homeomorphisms of a compact space preserving a given measure, Kerr-Li show one can compute the measure-theoretic entropy in a manner which uses the topology of the space. We show how to compute the entropy of a an action of homeomorphisms of a Polish space preserving a given measure, also in a manner which uses the topology of the space. We give applications to spectral properties of actions with positive entropy, as well as for actions o…
Associated to any orthogonal representation of a countable discrete group is an probability measure-preserving action called the Gaussian action. Using the Polish model formalism we developed before, we compute the entropy (in the sense of Bowen, Kerr-Li) of Gaussian actions when the group is sofic. Computations of entropy for Gaussian actions has only been done when the acting group is abelian and thus our results are new even in the amenable case. Fundamental to our approach are methods of noncommutative harmonic analysis and $C^{*}$-algebras which replace the Fourier analysis used in the ab…
We partially generalize Peters' formula on modules over the group ring ${\mathbb F} Γ$ for a given finite field ${\mathbb F}$ and a sofic group $Γ$. It is also discussed that how the values of entropy are related to the zero divisor conjecture.
We introduce a class of coded systems that we construct from sofic systems and Dyck shifts and we study a class of subshifts that we obtain by excluding words of length two from Dyck shifts. We derive expressions for zeta functions and topological entropy. We derive an expression for the zeta function of certain subshifts that we obtain by excluding words from Dyck shifts and of certain subshifts that we obtain by excluding words from the subshifts that are constructed from full shifts and Dyck shifts.
Recently Lewis Bowen introduced a notion of entropy for measure-preserving actions of a countable sofic group on a standard probability space admitting a generating partition with finite entropy. By applying an operator algebra perspective we develop a more general approach to sofic entropy which produces both measure and topological dynamical invariants, and we establish the variational principle in this context. In the case of residually finite groups we use the variational principle to compute the topological entropy of principal algebraic actions whose defining group ring element is invert…
Motivated by our previous results, we investigate structural properties of probability measure-preserving actions of sofic groups relative to their Pinsker factor. We also consider the same properties relative to the Outer Pinsker factor, which is another generalization of the Pinsker factor in the nonamenable case. The Outer Pinsker factor is motivated by extension entropy for extensions, which fixes some of the "pathological" behavior of sofic entropy: namely increase of entropy under factor maps. We show that an arbitrary probability measure-preserving action of a sofic group is mixing rela…
We relate Fuglede-Kadison determinants to entropy of algebraic actions of sofic groups in essentially complete generality. This generalizes recent results of Hanfeng Li and Andreas Thom from the amenable case to the sofic case, as well as results of David Kerr, Hanfeng Li, and Lewis Bowen in the residually finite case. Moreover, the proof given is the first calculation of entropy of algebraic actions to avoid a nontrivial determinant approximation. We apply our results to a problem of Christopher Deninger, generalizing results of Hanfeng Li and David Kerr. Finally, we show that in many cases, …
In this paper, we shall introduce $h$-expansiveness and asymptotical $h$-expansiveness for actions of sofic groups. By the definitions, each $h$-expansive action of sofic groups is asymptotically $h$-expansive. We show that each expansive action of sofic groups is $h$-expansive, and, for any given asymptotically $h$-expansive action of sofic groups, the entropy function (with respect to measures) is upper semi-continuous and hence the system admits a measure with maximal entropy. Observe that asymptotically $h$-expansive property was firstly introduced and studied by Misiurewicz for $\mathbb{Z…
We study an invariant of dynamical systems called naive entropy, which is defined for both measurable and topological actions of any countable group. We focus on nonamenable groups, in which case the invariant is two-valued, with every system having naive entropy either zero or infinity. Bowen has conjectured that when the acting group is sofic, zero naive entropy implies sofic entropy at most zero for both types of systems. We prove the topological version of this conjecture by showing that for every action of a sofic group by homeomorphisms of a compact metric space, zero naive entropy impli…
The purpose of this work is to bound sofic topological entropy of Toeplitz systems over residually finite groups and to prove the Krieger Theorem about attaining arbitrary entropy by the Toeplitz systems. To achieve these results, we discuss certain properties of the sofic topological entropy in the context of finitely indexed normal subgroups of the group. It will help us to formulate results almost independently of the natural sofic approximation sequences of residually finite groups.
A sofic approximation to a countable group is a sequence of partial actions on finite sets that asymptotically approximates the action of the group on itself by left-translations. A group is sofic if it admits a sofic approximation. Sofic entropy theory is a generalization of classical entropy theory in dynamics to actions by sofic groups. However, the sofic entropy of an action may depend on a choice of sofic approximation. All previously known examples showing this dependence rely on degenerate behavior. This paper exhibits an explicit example of a mixing subshift of finite type with two dif…
Let $Σ$ and $\barΣ$ be finite alphabets. For topologically transitive sofic systems $ X\subset Σ^{\Bbb Z}$ and $\widetilde X\subset \widetildeΣ^{\Bbb Z}$ we give a necessary and sufficient condition for the existence of a homomorphism from $X$ to $\widetilde X$. For topologically mixing sofic systems $X \subset Σ^{\Bbb Z}$ and $\widetilde X\subset \widetildeΣ^{\Bbb Z}$, such that the topological entropy of $\widetilde X$ is less than the topological entropy of $X$, we give a necessary and sufficient condition for the existence of a homomorphism of $X$ onto $\widetilde X$.
Given a countable sofic group $Γ$, a finite alphabet $A$, a subshift $X \subseteq A^Γ$, and a potential $ϕ: X \to \mathbb{R}$, we give sufficient conditions on $X$ and $ϕ$ for expressing, in the uniqueness regime, the sofic entropy of the associated Gibbs measure $μ$ as the limit of the Shannon entropies of some suitable finite systems approximating $Γ\curvearrowright (X,μ)$. Next, we prove that if $μ$ satisfies strong spatial mixing, then the sofic pressure admits a formula in terms of the integral of a random information function with respect to any $Γ$-invariant Borel probability measure wi…
Rigid actions have zero Rokhlin entropy and nonpositive sofic entropy. Because rigidity is a stable orbit-equivalence invariant, this provides the first example of an essentially free, ergodic, probability-measure-preserving action of the free group that has nonpositive sofic entropy and any essentially free action stably-orbit-equivalent to it also has nonpositive sofic entropy.
The $f$-invariant is an isomorphism invariant of free-group measure-preserving actions introduced by Lewis Bowen in [arXiv:0802.4294], where it was used to show that two finite-entropy Bernoulli shifts over a finitely generated free group can be isomorphic only if their base measures have the same Shannon entropy. In [arXiv:0902.0174] Bowen showed that the $f$-invariant is a variant of sofic entropy; in particular it is the exponential growth rate of the expected number of good models over a uniform random homomorphism. In this paper we present an analogous formula for the relative $f$-invaria…
We continue our study of the outer Pinsker factor for probability measure-preserving actions of sofic groups. Using the notion of doubly quenched convergence developed by Austin, we prove that in many cases the outer Pinsker factor of a product action is the product of the outer Pinsker factors. Our results are parallel to those of Seward for Rohklin entropy. We use these Pinsker products formulas to show that for many actions of a sofic group G on X where X is a compact group and the action is by automorphism, the (measurable) outer Pinsker factor of the action of G on X is given as a quotien…
We show that, for countable sofic groups, a Bernoulli action with infinite entropy base has infinite entropy with respect to every sofic approximation sequence. This builds on the work of Lewis Bowen in the case of finite entropy base and completes the computation of measure entropy for Bernoulli actions over countable sofic groups. One consequence is that such a Bernoulli action fails to have a generating countable partition with finite entropy if the base has infinite entropy, which in the amenable case is well known and in the case that the acting group contains the free group on two genera…
We show that a synchronized coded system $X$ is intrinsically ergodic of full support if and only if $ h(Y)$, the topological entropy of $Y$, is less than $h(X) $ whenever $Y$ is a proper subsystem of $ X $. We also show that like systems with specification property, SVGL's the non-mixing extension of systems with specification property, are intrinsically ergodic of full support. Moreover, we compute the entropy of the underlying graph of the Fischer cover of a synchronized system.
We say that two free probability-measure-preserving actions of countable groups are Shannon orbit equivalent if there is an orbit equivalence between them whose associated cocycle partitions have finite Shannon entropy. We show that if the acting groups are sofic and each has a w-normal amenable subgroup which is neither locally finite nor virtually cyclic then Shannon orbit equivalence implies that the actions have the same maximum sofic entropy. This extends a result of Austin beyond the finitely generated amenable setting and has the consequence that two Bernoulli actions of a group with th…
A probability-measure-preserving transformation has the Weak Pinsker Property (WPP) if for every $ε>0$ it is measurably conjugate to the direct product of a transformation with entropy $<ε$ and a Bernoulli shift. In a recent breakthrough, Tim Austin proved that every ergodic transformation satisfies this property. Moreover, the natural analog for amenable group actions is also true. By contrast, this paper provides a counterexample in which the group $Γ$ is a non-abelian free group and the notion of entropy is sofic entropy. The counterexample is a limit of hardcore models on random regular gr…
We prove a number of identities relating the sofic entropy of a certain class of non-expansive algebraic dynamical systems, the sofic entropy of the Wired Spanning Forest and the tree entropy of Cayley graphs of residually finite groups. We also show that homoclinic points and periodic points in harmonic models are dense under general conditions.
Let M=Z^D be a D-dimensional lattice, and let A be an abelian group. A^M is then a compact abelian group; a `linear cellular automaton' (LCA) is a topological group endomorphism Φ:A^M --> A^M that commutes with all shift maps. Suppose μis a probability measure on A^M whose support is a subshift of finite type or sofic shift. We provide sufficient conditions (on Φand μ) under which Φ`asymptotically randomizes' μ, meaning that wk*lim_{J\ni j --> oo} Φ^j μ= η, where ηis the Haar measure on A^M, and J has Cesaro density 1. In the case when Φ=1+σ, we provide a condition on μthat is both necessary a…
Sofic groups were defined implicitly by Gromov in [Gr99] and explicitly by Weiss in [We00]. All residually finite groups (and hence every linear group) is sofic. The purpose of this paper is to introduce, for every countable sofic group $G$, a family of measure-conjugacy invariants for measure-preserving $G$-actions on probability spaces. These invariants generalize Kolmogorov-Sinai entropy for actions of amenable groups. They are computed exactly for Bernoulli shifts over $G$, leading to a complete classification of Bernoulli systems up to measure-conjugacy for many groups including all count…
We continue the study of Rokhlin entropy, an isomorphism invariant for probability-measure-preserving actions of countable groups introduced in Part I. In this paper we prove a non-ergodic finite generator theorem and use it to establish sub-additivity and semi-continuity properties of Rokhlin entropy. We also obtain formulas for Rokhlin entropy in terms of ergodic decompositions and inverse limits. Finally, we clarify the relationship between Rokhlin entropy, sofic entropy, and classical Kolmogorov--Sinai entropy. In particular, using Rokhlin entropy we give a new proof of the fact that ergod…
We prove that a topologically predictable action of a countable amenable group has zero topological entropy, as conjectured by Hochman. On route, we investigate invariant random orders and formulate a unified Kieffer-Pinsker formula for the Kolmogorov-Sinai entropy of measure preserving actions of amenable groups. We also present a proof due to Weiss for the fact that topologically prime actions of sofic groups have non-positive topological sofic entropy.
Let $S=\{s_{n}\}$ be an increasing finite or infinite subset of $\mathbb N \bigcup \{0\}$ and $X(S)$ the $S$-gap shift associated to $S$. Let $f_{S}(x)=1-\sum\frac{1}{x^{s_{n}+1}}$ be the entropy function which will be vanished at $2^{h(X(S))}$ where $h(X(S))$ is the entropy of the system. Suppose $X(S)$ is sofic with adjacency matrix $A$ and the characteristic polynomial $χ_{A}$. Then for some rational function $ Q_{S} $, $χ_{A}(x)=Q_{S}(x)f_{S}(x)$. This $ Q_{S} $ will be explicitly determined. We will show that $ζ(t)=\frac{1}{f_{S}(t^{-1})}$ or $ζ(t)=\frac{1}{(1-t)f_{S}(t^{-1})}$ when $|S|<…
In this work we study the entropies of subsystems of shifts of finite type (SFTs) and sofic shifts on countable amenable groups. We prove that for any countable amenable group $G$, if $X$ is a $G$-SFT with positive topological entropy $h(X) > 0$, then the entropies of the SFT subsystems of $X$ are dense in the interval $[0, h(X)]$. In fact, we prove a "relative" version of the same result: if $X$ is a $G$-SFT and $Y \subset X$ is a subshift such that $h(Y) < h(X)$, then the entropies of the SFTs $Z$ for which $Y \subset Z \subset X$ are dense in $[h(Y), h(X)]$. We also establish analogous resu…
Motivated by our results in "Polish Models and Sofic Entropy," we define modified version of the independence tuples for sofic entropy developed by Kerr and Li. These modified version essentially require that the independence sequences give rise to representations weakly contained in the left regular when projected onto the Koopman representation. Using this, we can generalize our previous results for Deninger's Problem. Namely, we can show that if G is a sofic group, and if f is in M_{n}(Z(G)) and is invertible as an operator on l^{2}(G)^{n}, then the Fuglede-Kadison determinant of f is 1 if …
Let $G$ be a sofic group, and let $Σ= (σ_n)_{n\geq 1}$ be a sofic approximation to it. For a probability-preserving $G$-system, a variant of the sofic entropy relative to $Σ$ has recently been defined in terms of sequences of measures on its model spaces that `converge' to the system in a certain sense. Here we prove that, in order to study this notion, one may restrict attention to those sequences that have the asymptotic equipartition property. This may be seen as a relative of the Shannon--McMillan theorem in the sofic setting. We also give some first applications of this result, including …
We continue our study of when topological and measure-theoretic entropy agree for algebraic action of sofic groups. Specifically, we provide a new abstract method to prove that an algebraic action is strongly sofic. The method is based on passing to a "limiting object" for sequences of measures which are asymptotically supported on topological microstates. This limiting object has a natural poset structure that we are able to exploit to prove a max-min principle: if the sofic approximation has ergodic centralizer, then the largest subgroup on which the action is a local weak$^{*}$-limit of mea…
We prove a formula for the sofic entropy of expansive principal algebraic actions of residually finite groups, extending recent work of Deninger and Schmidt.
Consider a Hölder continuous potential $ϕ$ defined on the full shift $A^\nn$, where $A$ is a finite alphabet. Let $X\subset A^\nn$ be a specified sofic subshift. It is well-known that there is a unique Gibbs measure $μ_ϕ$ on $X$ associated to $ϕ$. Besides, there is a natural nested sequence of subshifts of finite type $(X_m)$ converging to the sofic subshift $X$. To this sequence we can associate a sequence of Gibbs measures $(μ_ϕ^m)$. In this paper, we prove that these measures weakly converge at exponential speed to $μ_ϕ$ (in the classical distance metrizing weak topology). We also establish…
We prove that if a free ergodic action of a countably infinite group has positive Rokhlin entropy (or, less generally, positive sofic entropy) then it factors onto all Bernoulli shifts of lesser or equal entropy. This extends to all countably infinite groups the well-known Sinai factor theorem from classical entropy theory.
A probability measure is a characteristic measure of a topological dynamical system if it is invariant to the automorphism group of the system. We show that zero entropy shifts always admit characteristic measures. We use similar techniques to show that automorphism groups of minimal zero entropy shifts are sofic.