Namespaces
Variants
Actions

Ergodicity

From Encyclopedia of Mathematics
Revision as of 17:21, 7 February 2011 by 127.0.0.1 (talk) (Importing text file)
(diff) ← Older revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)
Jump to: navigation, search

of a dynamical system

A property considered in ergodic theory. Originally it was defined for a cascade or a flow (continuous-time dynamical system) with a finite invariant measure in the following way: If a function is given on the phase space , then for almost-every point the time average along the trajectory of this point exists, that is,

or

exists, and coincides with the space average (that is, with ). In this case one also speaks of ergodicity of . In particular, for any measurable set the average time of a trajectory staying in is proportional to for almost-every point (in fact, this property is equivalent to ergodicity). When the Birkhoff ergodic theorem had been proved it became clear that ergodicity is equivalent to metric transitivity. Therefore one spoke of ergodicity, meaning metric transitivity, in the more general situation when it was no longer suitable to talk of the equality of time and space averages (systems with an infinite invariant or quasi-invariant measure, not only flows and cascades, but also more general transformation groups and semi-groups).

How to Cite This Entry:
Ergodicity. Encyclopedia of Mathematics. URL: http://encyclopediaofmath.org/index.php?title=Ergodicity&oldid=17465
This article was adapted from an original article by D.V. Anosov (originator), which appeared in Encyclopedia of Mathematics - ISBN 1402006098. See original article