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I asked this question on math.stackexchange and I was suggested that asking it may be more appropriate. This is part of my research which tries to extend some of Choquet's theory to some non-compact non-separable spaces (with other structures).

The only proof of Jensen inequality (and most general version) that I know is a direct consequence of the Fenchel-Moreau Theorem : If $X$ is a locally convex Hausdorff topological space, let $\mu$ be a Borel probability measure and $x\in X$ be such that for all continuous linear functional $x^\ast\in X^\ast$, $\int_X \langle y,x^\ast\rangle~d\mu=\langle x,x^\ast\rangle$ then we say that $\mu$ averages to $x$, in symbol $\mu\sim x$. The Fenchel-Moreau theorem states that the bidual of a proper l.s.c. convex function $f$ is the function itself. Recall that $f^\ast(x^\ast)=\sup_{x\in X} \langle x,x^\ast \rangle-f(x)$ and $f^{\ast\ast}(x)=\sup_{x^\ast\in X^\ast} \langle x,x^\ast\rangle-f^\ast(x^\ast)$, the theorem states that on $X$, $f=f^{\ast\ast}$.

Suppose that $\mu\sim x$ and $f$ is a proper l.s.c. convex function, then by Fenchel's inequality, for any $y\in X$ and any $x^\ast\in X^\ast$, $\langle y,x^\ast\rangle\leq f(y)+f^\ast(x^\ast)$, taking the integral over $\mu$ we get \begin{align*} \langle x,x^\ast\rangle &= \int_X \langle y,x^\ast\rangle d\mu(y)\\ &\leq \int_X \left[f(y)+f^\ast(x^\ast)\right] d\mu(y)\\ &= \int_X f ~d\mu + f^\ast(x^\ast) \end{align*} and therefore $\langle x,x^\ast\rangle-f^\ast(x^\ast)\leq \int_X f ~d\mu$ for all $x^\ast\in X^\ast$, taking the supremum of the LHS over $x^\ast\in X^\ast$ we get $f(x)=f^{\ast\ast}(x)\leq \int_X f~d\mu$.


I am wondering if the result can be extended to any measurable convex function and if there is any literature on the subject. Is there something like

For any Borel probability measure $\mu$ such that $\mu\sim x\in X$ and any bounded measurable convex functional $f:X\to\mathbb R$, $f(x)\leq \int_X f~d\mu$.

Or is there any reason to believe that this would be false ? Also if true can we generalize to other measurable spaces $X$ where all points can be separated by measurable linear functional ? The case where $X$ is the $\sigma$-algebra generated by a Banach space space would be interesting, I think that in this case we might be able to conclude that any convex bounded function (without measurability) is actually lower semi continuous.


I think that I have a hint of proof whenever $X$ is a convex open subset of a Banach space and $f$ is a bounded convex functional, I think this is along the lines of what @MaoWao suggests. I would like to generalize this proof to the case where $X$ is a closed and bounded subset of a Banach space. We prove that in this case $f$ is actually lower semi continuous, by way of contradiction. Suppose that there is $x\in X$ and $x_n\to x$ such that $\liminf_n f(x_n) =f(x)-\delta$ with $\delta>0$ (which we want to contradict). Since $X$ is an open set, there is $\varepsilon>0$ such that $B_{2\varepsilon}(x)\in X$, for any $n$, define $y_n=x-\varepsilon\frac{x_n-x}{\| x_n-x \|}\in B_{2\varepsilon}$. Observe that for any $n$, $x= (1-\alpha_n)x_n + \alpha_n y_n$ with $\alpha_n=\frac{\| x_n-x\|}{\|x_n-x\|+\varepsilon}$ and therefore by convexity, \begin{align*} \Leftrightarrow&&(\| x_n-x\|+\varepsilon)f(x) &\leq \varepsilon f(x_n)+\| x_n-x\| f(y_n)\\ \Leftrightarrow&&\|x_n-x\| f(x) +\varepsilon (f(x)-f(x_n))\leq \|x_n-x\| f(y_n)\\ \Rightarrow && 0<\varepsilon \delta\leq \liminf_n\|x_n-x\| f(y_n)\\ \end{align*} But if $f$ is bounded then the RHS is $0$ which is a contradiction. Now since $f$ is l.s.c. then Jensen inequality applies and we are done.

I am much more interested in the case where $X$ is a closed, convex and bounded subset of Banach space, in this case it feels like a similar argument could be made by working in the largest relatively open subset of $X$ containing $x$, i.e. the largest set containing $x$ in it's relative interior, but there are many point I do not master here, any reference on that would be welcome, the only one I know is Rockafelar for finite dimension.

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  • $\begingroup$ Can you clarify what you mean by "bounded" in "bounded measurable convex function"? $\endgroup$
    – gerw
    Commented Oct 13, 2022 at 7:02
  • $\begingroup$ @gerw I am trying to make use of the comment in this post :mathoverflow.net/questions/260213/… . I think you are right that this is not really well defined if there is no underlying topology, therefore we may assume that there is an underlying Hausdorff topology (I am also interested in the case where $X$ is a closed and bounded subset of a Banach space). I will edit to change the question accordingly. $\endgroup$
    – P. Quinton
    Commented Oct 13, 2022 at 14:25

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