Brownian Motion

2 Stochastic processes

Let \(T\) be an index set and \(\Omega \) a measurable space, with measure \(\mathbb {P}\). A stochastic process is a function \(X : T \to \Omega \to E\), where \(E\) is another measurable space, such that for all \(t \in T\), \(X_t : \Omega \to E\) is \(\mathbb {P}\)-a.e. measurable.

Definition 2.1 Law of a stochastic process
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The law of a stochastic process \(X\) is the measure on the measurable space \(E^T\) obtained by pushing forward the measure \(\mathbb {P}\) by the map \(\omega \mapsto X(\cdot , \omega )\).

Lean remark: we don’t use a Lean definition for the law, but write the map in full.

Definition 2.2 Modification
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We say that a stochastic process \(Y\) is a modification of another stochastic process \(X\) if for all \(t \in T\), \(Y_t =_{\mathbb {P}\text{-a.e.}} X_t\).

Lean remark: we don’t use a Lean definition for being a modification, but write explicitly the condition \(\forall t \in T,\ Y_t =_{\mathbb {P}\text{-a.e.}} X_t\) .

Definition 2.3 Indistinguishable
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We say that a stochastic processes \(Y\) is a indistinguishable from \(X\) if \(\mathbb {P}\)-a.e., for all \(t \in T\), \(X_t = Y_t\).

A summary of the next few lemmas is this:

  • indistinguishable \(\implies \) modification \(\implies \) same law,

  • modification and continuous with \(T\) separable \(\implies \) indistinguishable.

Lemma 2.4

If \(Y\) is indistinguishable from \(X\), then \(Y\) is a modification of \(X\).

Proof

Obvious.

Lemma 2.5
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Let \(X, Y : T \to \Omega \to E\) be two stochastic processes that are modifications of each other. Then for all \(t_1, \ldots , t_n \in T\), the random vector \((X_{t_1}, \ldots , X_{t_n})\) has the same distribution as the random vector \((Y_{t_1}, \ldots , Y_{t_n})\). That is, \(X\) and \(Y\) have same finite-dimensional distributions.

Proof

By the modification property, almost surely \(X_{t_i} = Y_{t_i}\) for all \(i \in [n]\). Thus the function \(\omega \mapsto (X_{t_1}(\omega ), \ldots , X_{t_n}(\omega ))\) is equal to \(\omega \mapsto (Y_{t_1}(\omega ), \ldots , Y_{t_n}(\omega ))\) almost surely, hence the maps of \(\mathbb {P}\) by these two functions are equal.

Lemma 2.6
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Let \(X, Y : T \to \Omega \to E\) be two stochastic processes. Then \(X\) and \(Y\) have same finite-dimensional distributions if and only if they have the same law.

Proof

TODO: consider the \(\pi \)-system of cylinder sets.

Lemma 2.7

Let \(T\) and \(E\) be topological spaces and suppose that \(T\) is separable Hausdorff. Let \(X, Y : T \to \Omega \to E\) be two stochastic processes that are modifications of each other and are almost surely continuous. Then \(X\) and \(Y\) are indistinguishable.

Proof

Since \(T\) is separable, it has a countable dense subset \(D\). Since \(D\) is countable,

\begin{align*} (\forall t \in D, \mathbb {P}\text{-a.e.}, X_t = Y_t) \iff (\mathbb {P}\text{-a.e.}, \forall t \in D, X_t = Y_t) \end{align*}

Hence by the modification property we have that almost surely, for all \(t \in D\), \(X_t = Y_t\). Then almost surely \(X\) and \(Y\) are continuous functions which are equal on a dense subset of \(T\): those two functions are equal everywhere.