Does an infinite random sequence contains (in)finitely many time its prefixes?

121 Views Asked by At

Consider an infinite random sequence $S=[i_1, i_2, ...]$ built with digits 0 to 9 (or any other alphabet). Every digit has a probability > 0 to be picked each time.

Consider a prefix of $S$, $S_k$ the finite sequence of $k$ elements from the first element to the $k$ element of $S$

$S_k$ = $[i_1,...,i_k]$

Suppose there exist some values of $k$ such that:

$S_{2k}$ = $[i_1, ...i_{2k}]$ = $[i_1, ..., i_k, i_1, ..., i_k]$ = $S_k^\frown S_k$

($^\frown$ is the concatenation operation.)

Define $S$ as birbant if $S_{2k}$ has the property to be equal to $S_k^\frown S_k$, with $k > m, m \in \mathbb{N}$ for any value of $m$.

Define $S$ as anti-birbant if does not exist any $S_{2k}$ that has the property to be equal to $S_k^\frown S_k$, with $k > m, m \in \mathbb{N}$ for any value of $m$.

Define $S$ as semi-birbant if $S_{2k}$ has the property to be equal to $S_k^\frown S_k$, with $k > m, m \in \mathbb{N}$ for any $m < C$, and does not exist any $S_{2k}$ that has the property to be equal to $S_k^\frown S_k$ for $k > m$ when $m >= C$. With $C$ costant $ > 3$.

When $S$ is semi-birbant, there are $n$ $2k$-prefixes that have the above property, $S$ is also defined as n-semi-birbant .

What is the probability that any $S$ is birbant, anti-birbant or semi-birbant ?

Is there any predominance of a particular class n-semi-birbant classes for any $S$, or is it possible to compute an expected value of n ?

Does this depend on the size of the alphabet?

Example 1 (a pipe is inserted at the end of every $S_{2k}$):

S = 1,1|,2,1,1,2|,7,2,1,5,2,1,1,2,1,1,2,7,2,1,5,2| ...

We have:

  • $S_2$ equal to $S_{1}^\frown S_{1}$
  • $S_6$ equal to $S_{3}^\frown S_{3}$
  • $S_{22}$ equal to $S_{11}^\frown S_{11}$

If no more prefixes repeats, this sequence is semi-birbant (3-semi-birbant)

If an infinite number of repetition of prefixes occurs, this sequence is birbant

Example 2 (binary alphabet)

S = 1, 0, 1, 1, 0, 0, 1, 1, 1, 0, 0, 0... 

The sequence is generated by start with 10 and double the ones on the front and the zeros at the end, then split the digits and concatenate to S and repeat.

This sequence is not-birbant.


Related: Does an infinite random sequence contain all finite sequences?

1

There are 1 best solutions below

0
On BEST ANSWER

If you assume the random integers $\{I_i\}_{i=1}^{\infty}$ are i.i.d. equally likely over the 10-element set $\{0, ..., 9\}$ then $$P[S_{2k}=[S_k:S_k]]=(1/10)^k \quad \forall k \in \{1, 2, 3, ...\}$$ and so $$ \sum_{k=1}^{\infty} P[S_{2k}=[S_k:S_k]] < \infty$$ Therefore, the Borel-Cantelli theorem says that, with probability 1, there are only a finite number of integers $k$ for which $S_{2k}=[S_k:S_k]$.

So (assuming I understand your definitions properly), the probability of being Birbant is zero.

You get a similar result if the alphabet size is any positive integer $m\geq 2$ (we do not require $m=10$). For $m\geq 2$ we have $\sum_{k=1}^{\infty} (1/m)^k<\infty$.