An Operator-Theoretic Characterization of Gaussian Measure Singularity under Mean Shifts

Source abstract

For two Gaussian random elements on a separable Hilbert space with common covariance operator, the fourth-order moment tensor structure of their mixture admits an operator-valued representation obtained from the purely quadratic component of the class-conditional second moment. We identify the tensor mechanism generating the completely diagonal coefficients of this fourth-order representation after covariance standardization, and show that these coefficients are governed entirely by the coordinatewise Cameron-Martin energy of the mean shift. This yields a necessary and sufficient condition, together with an explicit eigenvalue, for the Fisher discriminant to be an eigenfunction of the induced coordinatewise operator. We further introduce aggregated fourth-order spectral functionals for two complementary constructions, one built from fourth-order moments and the other from a product-of-expectations counterpart, and prove that they are asymptotically equivalent precisely when the underlying Gaussian measures are mutually singular. These results provide a spectral realization of the classical Cameron-Martin criterion through higher-order moment operators, explaining the probabilistic origin of fourth-order spectral quantities previously proposed for Gaussian discrimination and functional data classification and relating them to the "near-perfect classification" regime.