English

Every string has probabilistic automatic complexity at most three

Formal Languages and Automata Theory 2026-07-28 v1 Logic

Abstract

Gill (arXiv:2402.13376) introduced the probabilistic automatic complexity AP(w)A_P(w) of a finite string ww: the least number of states of a probabilistic finite automaton (PFA) for which ww is the unique most probably accepted string of its length. He asked whether APA_P is unbounded, noting that no string with AP>3A_P > 3 was known (Question 4.14 of that paper). We answer the question by proving that AP(w)3A_P(w)\le 3 for every string ww over every finite alphabet. The witnessing three-state automaton is explicit: its reduced dynamics tracks the pair (u,u2)(u,u^2), where uu is the reversed base-bb value of the input, and its acceptance functional is a downward parabola peaked at the value of the target string. Combined with Gill's classification of the binary strings with AP=2A_P=2, this completely determines APA_P on binary strings.

Cite

@article{arxiv.2607.26275,
  title  = {Every string has probabilistic automatic complexity at most three},
  author = {Bjørn Kjos-Hanssen},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2607.26275},
  year   = {2026}
}