There are a variety of results in the literature proving forms of computability for topological entropy and pressure on subshifts. In this work, we prove two quite general results, showing that topological pressure is always computable from above given an enumeration for a forbidden list inducing the subshift, and that for strongly irreducible shifts of finite type, topological pressure is computable. Our results apply to subshifts on all finitely generated amenable groups with decidable word problem and generalize several previous results which applied only to $\mathbb{Z}^d$-subshifts.
As corollaries, we obtain some results related to ground state energy and entropy, proving that the map sending $ϕ$ to $\sup_{μ\in M_σ(X)} \int ϕdμ$ is computable/computable from above when $P_X(ϕ)$ is, and that the map sending $ϕ$ to its ground state/residual entropy is computable from above when $P_X(ϕ)$ is computable.
We conclude by giving explicit bounds on computation time of $P_X(ϕ)$ in the $\mathbb{Z}^d$ setting for SI SFTs and locally constant and rational valued $ϕ$, and show that in the special case $X = A^{\mathbb{Z}^2}$, this algorithm runs in singly exponential time.
We study the difficulty of computing topological entropy of subshifts subjected to mixing restrictions. This problem is well-studied for multidimensional subshifts of finite type : there exists a threshold in the irreducibility rate where the difficulty jumps from computable to uncomputable, but its location is an open problem. In this paper, we establish the location of this threshold for a more general class, subshifts with decidable languages, in any dimension.
Let $G$ be an amenable group and let $A$ be a finite set. We prove that if $X \subset A^G$ is a strongly irreducible subshift then $X$ has the Myhill property, that is, every pre-injective cellular automaton $τ\colon X \to X$ is surjective.
We prove in this text a characterization of the possible entropy dimensions of minimal tridimensional subshifts of finite type with a computability condition, using Goldbach's theorem on Fermat numbers.
In this paper, we study the descriptive set theoretic complexity of the equivalence relation of conjugacy of Toeplitz subshifts of a residually finite group $G$. On the one hand, we show that if $G = \mathbb{Z}$, then topological conjugacy on Toeplitz subshifts with separated holes is amenable. In contrast, if $G$ is non-amenable, then conjugacy of Toeplitz $G$-subshifts is a non-amenable equivalence relation. The results were motivated by a general question, asked by Gao, Jackson and Seward, about the complexity of conjugacy for minimal, free subshifts of countable groups.
We give a combinatorial characterization of amenability of monomial algebras and prove the existence of monomial Folner sequences, answering a question due to Ceccherini-Silberstein and Samet-Vaillant. We then use our characterization to prove that over projectively simple monomial algebras, every module is exhaustively amenable; we conclude that convolution algebras of minimal subshifts admit the same property. We deduce that any minimal subshift of positive entropy gives rise to a graded algebra which does not satisfy an extension of Vershik's conjecture on amenable groups, proposed by Barth…
Let $G$ be a countable infinite amenable group and $P$ be a polyhedron. We give a construction of minimal subshifts of $P^G$ with arbitrarily mean topological dimension less than $\dim P$.
In this paper we show that for every congruent monotileable amenable group $G$ and for every metrizable Choquet simplex $K$, there exists a minimal $G$-subshift, which is free on a full measure set, whose set of invariant probability measures is affine homeomorphic to $K$. If the group is virtually abelian, the subshift is free. Congruent monotileable amenable groups are a generalization of amenable residually finite groups. In particular, we show that this class contains all the infinite countable virtually nilpotent groups. This article is a generalization to congruent monotileable amenable …
We investigate an analogue of the L^2-Betti numbers for amenable linear subshifts. The role of the von Neumann dimension shall be played by the topological entropy.
In this paper, we mainly elucidate a close relationship between the topological entropy and mean dimension theory for actions of polynomial growth groups. We show that metric mean dimension and mean Hausdorff dimension of subshifts with respect to the lower rank subgroup are equal to its topological entropy multiplied by the growth rate of the subgroup. Meanwhile, we also prove the above result holds for the rate distortion dimension of subshifts with respect to the lower rank subgroup and measure entropy. Furthermore, some relevant examples are indicated.
The aim of this paper is to study growth properties of group extensions of hyperbolic dynamical systems, where we do not assume that the extension satisfies the symmetry conditions seen, for example, in the work of Stadlbauer on symmetric group extensions and of the authors on geodesic flows. Our main application is to growth rates of periodic orbits for covers of an Anosov flow: we reduce the problem of counting periodic orbits in an amenable cover $X$ to counting in a maximal abelian subcover $X^{\mathrm{ab}}$. In this way, we obtain an equivalence for the Gurevič entropy: $h(X)=h(X^{\mathrm…
Suppose $(X,σ)$ is a subshift, $P_X(n)$ is the word complexity function of $X$, and ${\rm Aut}(X)$ is the group of automorphisms of $X$. We show that if $P_X(n)=o(n^2/\log^2 n)$, then ${\rm Aut}(X)$ is amenable (as a countable, discrete group). We further show that if $P_X(n)=o(n^2)$, then ${\rm Aut}(X)$ can never contain a nonabelian free semigroup (and, in particular, can never contain a nonabelian free subgroup). This is in contrast to recent examples, due to Salo and Schraudner, of subshifts with quadratic complexity that do contain such a semigroup.
In this paper, we investigate the computability of thermodynamic invariants at zero temperature for one-dimensional subshifts of finite type. In particular, we prove that the residual entropy (i.e., the joint ground state entropy) is an upper semi-computable function on the space of continuous potentials, but it is not computable. Next, we consider locally constant potentials for which the zero-temperature measure is known to exist. We characterize the computability of the zero-temperature measure and its entropy for potentials that are constant on cylinders of a given length k. In particular,…
The dynamics of symbolic systems, such as multidimensional subshifts of finite type or cellular automata, are known to be closely related to computability theory. In particular, the appropriate tools to describe and classify topological entropy for this kind of systems turned out to be of computational nature. Part of the great importance of these symbolic systems relies on the role they have played in understanding more general systems over non-symbolic spaces. The aim of this article is to investigate topological entropy from a computability point of view in this more general, not necessaril…
We prove inequalities relating the measures of maximal entropy of two patterns u,v where the extender set of u is contained in the extender set of v. Our main results are two generalizations of a Theorem of Meyerovitch; the first applies to all such v,w when G=Z, and the second to v,w with the same shape and any countable amenable finitely generated torsion-free G. As a consequence of our results we give new and simpler proofs of several facts about synchronizing subshifts and we answer a question of Climenhaga.
We show that every Grigorchuk group $G_ω$ embeds in (the commutator subgroup of) the topological full group of a minimal subshift. In particular, the topological full group of a Cantor minimal system can have subgroups of intermediate growth, a question raised by Grigorchuk; it can also have finitely generated infinite torsion subgroups, as well as residually finite subgroups that are not elementary amenable, answering questions of Cornulier. By estimating the word-complexity of this subshift, we deduce that every Grigorchuk group $G_ω$ can be embedded in a finitely generated simple group that…
Given a continuous dynamical system $f:X\to X$ on a compact metric space $X$ and an $m$-dimensional continuous potential $Φ:X\to \mathbb R^m$, the (generalized) rotation set ${\rm Rot}(Φ)$ is defined as the set of all $μ$-integrals of $Φ$, where $μ$ runs over all invariant probability measures. Analogous to the classical topological entropy, one can associate the localized entropy ${\mathcal H}(w)$ to each $w\in {\rm Rot}(Φ)$. In this paper, we study the computability of rotation sets and localized entropy functions by deriving conditions that imply their computability. We then apply our resul…
In this short note, for countably infinite amenable group actions, we provide topological proofs for the following results: Bowen topological entropy (dimensional entropy) of the whole space equals the usual topological entropy along tempered Følner sequences; the Hausdorff dimension of an amenable subshift (for certain metric associated to some Følner sequence) equals its topological entropy. This answers questions by Zheng and Chen (Israel Journal of Mathematics 212 (2016), 895-911) and Simpson (Theory Comput. Syst. 56 (2015), 527-543).
We study random walk on topological full groups of subshifts, and show the existence of infinite, finitely generated, simple groups with the Liouville property. Results by Matui and Juschenko-Monod have shown that the derived subgroups of topological full groups of minimal subshifts provide the first examples of finitely generated, simple amenable groups. We show that if the (not necessarily minimal) subshift has a complexity function that grows slowly enough (e.g. linearly), then every symmetric and finitely supported probability measure on the topological full group has trivial Poisson-Furst…
We present a technique to lift some tilings of the discrete hyperbolic plane -- tilings defined by a 1D substitution -- into a zero entropy subshift of finite type (SFT) on non-abelian amenable Baumslag-Solitar groups $BS(1,n)$ for $n\geq2$. For well chosen hyperbolic tilings, this SFT is also aperiodic and minimal. As an application we construct a strongly aperiodic SFT on $BS(1,n)$ with a hierarchical structure, which is an analogue of Robinson's construction on $\mathbb{Z}^2$ or Goodman-Strauss's on $\mathbb{H}_2$.
We investigate the computability (in the sense of computable analysis) of the topological pressure $P_{\rm top}(ϕ)$ on compact shift spaces $X$ for continuous potentials $ϕ:X\to {\mathbb R}$. This question has recently been studied for subshifts of finite type (SFTs) and their factors (Sofic shifts). We develop a framework to address the computability of the topological pressure on general shift spaces and apply this framework to coded shifts. In particular, we prove the computability of the topological pressure for all continuous potentials on S-gap shifts, generalized gap shifts, and particu…
We generalize the classical definition of effectively closed subshift to finitely generated groups. We study classical stability properties of this class and then extend this notion by allowing the usage of an oracle to the word problem of a group. This new class of subshifts forms a conjugacy class that contains all sofic subshifts. Motivated by the question of whether there exists a group where the class of sofic subshifts coincides with that of effective subshifts, we show that the inclusion is strict for several groups, including recursively presented groups with undecidable word problem, …
We prove that for any transitive subshift $X$ with word complexity function $c_n(X)$, if $\liminf \frac{\log (c_n(X)/n)}{\log \log \log n} = 0$, then the quotient group $\textrm{Aut}(X,σ) / \langle σ\rangle$ of the automorphism group of $X$ by the subgroup generated by the shift $σ$ is locally finite. We prove that significantly weaker upper bounds on $c_n(X)$ imply the same conclusion if the Gap Conjecture from geometric group theory is true. Our proofs rely on a general upper bound for the number of automorphisms of $X$ of range $n$ in terms of word complexity, which may be of independent in…
Let $X$ be a compact metrizable space equipped with a continuous action of a countable amenable group $G$. Suppose that the dynamical system $(X,G)$ is expansive and is the quotient by a uniformly bounded-to-one factor map of a strongly irreducible subshift. Let $τ\colon X \to X$ be a continuous map commuting with the action of $G$. We prove that if there is no pair of distinct $G$-homoclinic points in $X$ having the same image under $τ$, then $τ$ is surjective.
Consider a subshift over a finite alphabet, $X\subset Λ^{\mathbb Z}$ (or $X\subsetΛ^{\mathbb N_0}$). With each finite block $B\inΛ^k$ appearing in $X$ we associate the empirical measure ascribing to every block $C\inΛ^l$ the frequency of occurrences of $C$ in $B$. By comparing the values ascribed to blocks $C$ we define a metric on the combined space of blocks $B$ and probability measures $μ$ on $X$, whose restriction to the space of measures is compatible with the weak-$\star$ topology. Next, in this combined metric space we fix an open set $\mathcal U$ containing all ergodic measures, and we…
We formulate and prove a very general relative version of the Dobrushin-Lanford-Ruelle theorem which gives conditions on constraints of configuration spaces over a finite alphabet such that for every absolutely summable relative interaction, every translation-invariant relative Gibbs measure is a relative equilibrium measure and vice versa. Neither implication is true without some assumption on the space of configurations. We note that the usual finite type condition can be relaxed to a much more general class of constraints. By "relative" we mean that both the interaction and the set of allow…
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…
Given a countable discrete amenable virtually orderable group $G$ acting by translations on a $G$-subshift $X \subseteq S^G$ and an absolutely summable potential $Φ$, we present a set of conditions to obtain a special integral representation of pressure $P(Φ)$. The approach is based on a Shannon-McMillan-Breiman (SMB) type theorem for Gibbs measures due to Gurevich-Tempelman (2007), and generalizes results from Gamarnik-Katz (2009), Helvik-Lindgren (2014), and Marcus-Pavlov (2015) by extending the setting to other groups besides $\mathbb{Z}^d$, by relaxing the assumptions on $X$ and $Φ$, and b…
The group of automorphisms of a symbolic dynamical system is countable, but often very large. For example, for a mixing subshift of finite type, the automorphism group contains isomorphic copies of the free group on two generators and the direct sum of countably many copies of $\mathbb{Z}$. In contrast, the group of automorphisms of a symbolic system of zero entropy seems to be highly constrained. Our main result is that the automorphism group of any minimal subshift of stretched exponential growth with exponent $<1/2$, is amenable (as a countable discrete group). For shifts of polynomial grow…
We consider topological dynamical systems $(X,T)$, where $X$ is a compact metrizable space and $T$ denotes an action of a countable amenable group $G$ on $X$ by homeomorphisms. For two such systems $(X,T)$ and $(Y,S)$ and a factor map $π: X \rightarrow Y$, an intermediate factor is a topological dynamical system $(Z,R)$ for which $π$ can be written as a composition of factor maps $ψ: X \rightarrow Z$ and $φ: Z \rightarrow Y$. In this paper we show that for any countable amenable group $G$, for any $G$-subshifts $(X,T)$ and $(Y,S)$, and for any factor map $ π:X \rightarrow Y$, the set of entrop…
Symbolic Extension Entropy Theorem (SEET) describes the possibility of a lossless digitalization of a dynamical system by extending it to a subshift. It gives an estimate on the entropy of symbolic extensions (and the necessary number of symbols). Unlike in the measure-theoretic case, where Kolmogorov--Sinai entropy is the estimate, in the topological setup the task reaches beyond the classical theory of entropy. Tools from an extended theory of entropy structures are needed. The main goal of this paper is to prove the SEET for actions of countable amenable groups: Let a countable amenable gro…
Let $G$ be a finitely generated amenable group. We study the space of shifts on $G$ over a given finite alphabet $A$. We show that the zero entropy shifts are generic in this space, and that more generally the shifts of entropy $c$ are generic in the space of shifts with entropy at least $c$. The same is shown to hold for the space of transitive shifts and for the space of weakly mixing shifts. As applications of this result, we show that for every entropy value $c \in [0,\log |A|]$ there is a weakly mixing subshift of $A^G$ with entropy $c$. We also show that the set of strongly irreducible s…
We study an abstract group of reversible Turing machines. In our model, each machine is interpreted as a homeomorphism over a space which represents a tape filled with symbols and a head carrying a state. These homeomorphisms can only modify the tape at a bounded distance around the head, change the state and move the head in a bounded way. We study three natural subgroups arising in this model: the group of finite-state automata, which generalizes the topological full groups studied in topological dynamics and the theory of orbit-equivalence; the group of oblivious Turing machines whose movem…
We define and study a class of subshifts of finite type (SFTs) defined by a family of allowed patterns of the same shape where, for any contents of the shape minus a corner, the number of ways to fill in the corner is the same. The main results are that for such an SFT, a locally legal pattern of convex shape is globally legal, and there is a measure that samples uniformly on all convex sets. Under suitable computability assumptions, this measure can be sampled, and legal configurations counted and enumerated, effectively and efficiently. We show by example that these subshifts need not admit …
Given a locally finite graph $Γ$, an amenable subgroup $G$ of graph automorphisms acting freely and almost transitively on its vertices, and a $G$-invariant activity function $λ$, consider the free energy $f_G(Γ,λ)$ of the hardcore model defined on the set of independent sets in $Γ$ weighted by $λ$. Under the assumption that $G$ is finitely generated and its word problem can be solved in exponential time, we define suitable ensembles of hardcore models and prove the following: if $\|λ\|_\infty < λ_c(Δ)$, there exists a randomized $ε$-additive approximation scheme for $f_G(Γ,λ)$ that runs in ti…
For a countable amenable group $G$ and a fixed dimension $m\geq 1$, we investigate when it is possible to embed a $G$-space $X$ into the $m$-dimensional cubical shift $([0,1]^m)^G$. We focus our attention on systems that arise as an extension of an almost finite $G$-action on a totally disconnected space $Y$, in the sense of Matui and Kerr. We show that if such a $G$-space $X$ has mean dimension less than $m/2$, then $X$ embeds into the $(m+1)$-dimensional cubical shift. If the distinguished factor $G$-space $Y$ is assumed to be a subshift of finite type, then this can be improved to an embedd…
We present several applications of the weak specification property and certain topological Markov properties, recently introduced by S. Barbieri, F. García-Ramos and H. Li, and implied by the pseudo-orbit tracing property, for general expansive group actions on compact spaces. First we show that any expansive action of a countable amenable group on a compact metrizable space satisfying the weak specification and strong topological Markov properties satisfies the Moore property, i.e. every surjective automorphism of such dynamical system is pre-injective. This together with an earlier result of…
We define a hierarchy of systems with topological completely positive entropy in the context of continuous countable amenable group actions on compact metric spaces. For each countable ordinal we construct a dynamical system on the corresponding level of the aforementioned hierarchy and provide subshifts of finite type for the first three levels. We give necessary and sufficient conditions for entropy pairs by means of the asymptotic relation on systems with the pseudo-orbit tracing property, and thus create a bridge between a result by Pavlov and a result by Meyerovitch. As a corollary, we an…
