Topological lower bounds for arithmetic networks

Abstract: We prove a complexity lower bound on deciding membership in a semialgebraic set for arithmetic networks in terms of the sum of Betti numbers with respect to "ordinary" (singular) homology. This result complements a similar lower bound by Montana, Morais and Pardo for locally close semialgebraic sets in terms of the sum of Borel-Moore Betti numbers. We also prove a lower bound in terms of the sum of Betti numbers of the projection of a semialgebraic set to a coordinate subspace.