TY - JOUR
T1 - Strong convergence in posets
AU - Ban, Amir
AU - Linial, Nati
PY - 2012/8
Y1 - 2012/8
N2 - We consider the following solitaire game whose rules are reminiscent of the children's game of leapfrog. The game is played on a poset (P, ≺) with n elements. The player is handed an arbitrary permutation π=(x 1, x 2, . . ., x n) of the elements in P. At each round an element may "skip over" a smaller element preceding it, i.e. swap positions with it. For example, if x i≺x i+1, then it is allowed to move from π to the permutation (x 1, x 2, . . ., x i-1, x i+1, x i, x i+2, . . ., x n) of P's elements. The player is to carry out such steps as long as such swaps are possible. When there are several consecutive pairs of elements that satisfy this condition, the player can choose which pair to swap next. Does the player's choice of swaps matter for the final permutation or is it uniquely determined by the initial order of P's elements? The reader may guess correctly that the latter proposition is correct. What may be more surprising, perhaps, is that this question is not trivial. The proof works by constructing an appropriate system of invariants.
AB - We consider the following solitaire game whose rules are reminiscent of the children's game of leapfrog. The game is played on a poset (P, ≺) with n elements. The player is handed an arbitrary permutation π=(x 1, x 2, . . ., x n) of the elements in P. At each round an element may "skip over" a smaller element preceding it, i.e. swap positions with it. For example, if x i≺x i+1, then it is allowed to move from π to the permutation (x 1, x 2, . . ., x i-1, x i+1, x i, x i+2, . . ., x n) of P's elements. The player is to carry out such steps as long as such swaps are possible. When there are several consecutive pairs of elements that satisfy this condition, the player can choose which pair to swap next. Does the player's choice of swaps matter for the final permutation or is it uniquely determined by the initial order of P's elements? The reader may guess correctly that the latter proposition is correct. What may be more surprising, perhaps, is that this question is not trivial. The proof works by constructing an appropriate system of invariants.
KW - Order
KW - Poset
KW - Strong convergence
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84858401166&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.jcta.2012.03.006
DO - 10.1016/j.jcta.2012.03.006
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AN - SCOPUS:84858401166
SN - 0097-3165
VL - 119
SP - 1299
EP - 1301
JO - Journal of Combinatorial Theory. Series A
JF - Journal of Combinatorial Theory. Series A
IS - 6
ER -