INVARIANT MEASURES CONCENTRATED ON COUNTABLE STRUCTURES

Abstract

Let $L$ be a countable language. We say that a countable infinite $L$ -structure ${\mathcal{M}}$ admits an invariant measure when there is a probability measure on the space of $L$ -structures with the same underlying set as ${\mathcal{M}}$ that is invariant under permutations of that set, and that assigns measure one to the isomorphism class of ${\mathcal{M}}$ . We show that ${\mathcal{M}}$ admits an invariant measure if and only if it has trivial definable closure, that is, the pointwise stabilizer in $\text{Aut}({\mathcal{M}})$ of an arbitrary finite tuple of ${\mathcal{M}}$ fixes no additional points. When ${\mathcal{M}}$ is a Fraïssé limit in a relational language, this amounts to requiring that the age of ${\mathcal{M}}$ have strong amalgamation. Our results give rise to new instances of structures that admit invariant measures and structures that do not.

Keywords

• 03C98 (primary)
• 60G09
• 37L40
• 05C80
• 03C75
• 62E10
• 05C63 (secondary)