Sum of squares lower bounds for refuting any CSP

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Publication:4977967




Abstract: Let P:0,1ko0,1 be a nontrivial k-ary predicate. Consider a random instance of the constraint satisfaction problem mathrmCSP(P) on n variables with Deltan constraints, each being P applied to k randomly chosen literals. Provided the constraint density satisfies Deltagg1, such an instance is unsatisfiable with high probability. The emph{refutation} problem is to efficiently find a proof of unsatisfiability. We show that whenever the predicate P supports a t-emph{wise uniform} probability distribution on its satisfying assignments, the sum of squares (SOS) algorithm of degree d=Theta(fracnDelta2/(t1)logDelta) (which runs in time nO(d)) emph{cannot} refute a random instance of mathrmCSP(P). In particular, the polynomial-time SOS algorithm requires widetildeOmega(n(t+1)/2) constraints to refute random instances of CSP(P) when P supports a t-wise uniform distribution on its satisfying assignments. Together with recent work of Lee et al. [LRS15], our result also implies that emph{any} polynomial-size semidefinite programming relaxation for refutation requires at least widetildeOmega(n(t+1)/2) constraints. Our results (which also extend with no change to CSPs over larger alphabets) subsume all previously known lower bounds for semialgebraic refutation of random CSPs. For every constraint predicate~P, they give a three-way hardness tradeoff between the density of constraints, the SOS degree (hence running time), and the strength of the refutation. By recent algorithmic results of Allen et al. [AOW15] and Raghavendra et al. [RRS16], this full three-way tradeoff is emph{tight}, up to lower-order factors.




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