All Questions
Tagged with estimation-theory pr.probability
44 questions
20
votes
1
answer
4k
views
Using Fisher Information to bound KL divergence
Is it possible to use Fisher Information at p to get a useful upper bound on KL(q,p)?
KL(q,p) is known as Kullback-Liebler divergence and is defined for discrete distributions over k outcomes as ...
- 2,252
7
votes
1
answer
569
views
Singular Fisher information matrix and existence of unbiased estimators
I'm doing some research into the Cramer-Rao bound for time of arrival localization and have come across a rather strange result: the FIM is singular, but there exists an unbiased estimator. My ...
- 75
6
votes
1
answer
434
views
Probability of complex eigenvalues
I find this is the best site to post this question, even though I considered cs.
It is a Monte Carlo experiment over the set of 10.000 n×n matrices.
If a single matrix eigenvalue is complex then ...
- 171
5
votes
1
answer
107
views
Estimating the size of the remainder in a random partition
Pick a sequence of real numbers $x_i$ as follows. Put $x_0=1$. If $x_i$ is chosen, then pick $x_{i+1}\in[0, x_i]$ according to the uniform distribution. Obviously we have $x_i\rightarrow 0$ with ...
4
votes
1
answer
203
views
Can samples be compressed?
The Fisher information of a random variable $Y$ about a parameter $\theta$ upon which the probability of $Y$ depends is:
$\mathcal{I}_Y(\theta)= -E\left[\left.\strut \frac{\partial^2}{\partial \theta^...
- 22.1k
4
votes
1
answer
479
views
Cramér-Rao bound for randomized estimator
As is well known, the Cramér-Rao bound (or information inequality) sets a lower bound on the variance of estimators of a parameter.
Consider the case when the parameter is a scalar, the estimator is ...
- 337
4
votes
2
answers
519
views
Cramér–Rao type bound for absolute estimation error
Let $\{X_1, X_2, \dotsc, X_n\}$ be independent and identically distributed (i.i.d.) random variables sampled from a common distribution with density $f_{\theta}(x)$, where $\theta$ is an unknown ...
- 544
4
votes
1
answer
288
views
Equivalent method for maximum likelihood estimation of covariance parameters
My goal is to estimate the parameters of a covariance matrix $\Omega$, by maximizing the following log-likelihood function:
$$\log L(\vec\tau, \rho, \sigma \mid W, X) = -m\ln(\left | \Omega \right |) ...
- 141
3
votes
3
answers
2k
views
Is the min function ever an unbiased estimator for the mean?
Given $n$ i.i.d. variables $X_1$ to $X_n$ with an unknown probability distribution, the sample average is an unbiased estimator for the mean of the distribution. Is there some non-trivial probability ...
- 597
3
votes
1
answer
578
views
Why doesn't Stein effect happen for multinomial distributions?
(Medeen, et all, 1998)" show that Maximum Likelihood estimate is admissible for multinomial distribution under squared error. On other hand, James and Stein showed that arithmetic average is not an ...
- 2,252
3
votes
2
answers
566
views
Moments of Matrix Gamma distribution
Matrix gamma distribution (defined for example in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matrix_gamma_distribution) is one way to generalize Wishart distribution. In our course work that distribution was used ...
- 31
3
votes
1
answer
113
views
maximum likelihood estimation of X is better than that of f(X)?
Consider a binary variable $C$ with $\Pr(C=0)=\Pr(C=1)=0.5$. Consider a random vector $X \in \mathbb{R}^d$, characterized by $C$, with PDF $p_m(x)$, $m\in\{0,1\}$. Define a maximum likelihood (ML) ...
- 482
3
votes
1
answer
139
views
Design a random variable which has the maximal correlation with another random variable
$Y$ is a Gaussian distributed random variable with zero mean and known variance: $Y\sim N(0,\sigma_y)$. We measure $Y$ with a sensor, which is corrupted by white Gaussian noise: $Z=Y+V$; $V\sim N(0,\...
- 61
3
votes
1
answer
87
views
Optimal linear measurement operator
Let $x\in R^n$ be an unknown vector. Suppose I am allowed to choose any $A\in R^{m\times n}$, under the constraint that each row of $A$ has $\ell_2$ norm at most $1$. Then I carry out a "measurement", ...
- 6,541
3
votes
1
answer
96
views
Perturbation results for statistical estimators
Suppose I have a continuous random variable whose distribution $f$ is some parametric form (normal, exponential, etc.) that is known to me. If I draw many independent samples $x_i$ from $f$, I can ...
- 4,049
3
votes
0
answers
82
views
Uniform mean-square-error estimates
Consider a standard statistical estimation problem with iid real observations $\{X_i\}_{i=1}^N$. For a collection of real functions $\mathcal{F}$, I want to get an estimate of the uniform rate of ...
- 111
2
votes
2
answers
632
views
An alternative proof of Bayesian Cramer-Rao
My question is:
Are there an alternative proof of Cramer-Rao lower bound that does not use
Cauchy-Swartz inequality?
Let me outline the classical proof and explain why I am interested in this ...
- 671
2
votes
1
answer
131
views
Almost sure convergence of double averages of IID random variables
Let $ \{X_i\}_{i=1}^{P} $ and $ \{Y_j\}_{j=1}^{Q} $ be two sequences of independent and identically distributed (i.i.d.) random variables. $X_i$ and $Y_j$ are independent between all pairs of $i$ and $...
- 433
2
votes
1
answer
872
views
Estimating the average of two gaussians' mean
Assume that $X\sim \mathcal N(\sigma_1,\mu_1)$ and $Y\sim \mathcal N(\sigma_2,\mu_2)$.
I want to estimate $\frac{\mu_1+\mu_2}{2}$ after observing $X,Y$.
In my setting, $\sigma_1,\sigma_2$ are known ...
- 618
2
votes
1
answer
676
views
Distribution of ratio between complex Gaussian and Chi-square R.V.s
What would be the distribution (p.d.f.) of the following ratio?
$$z = \frac{x_{1}}{|x_{1}|^2 + |x_{2}|^2 + ... + |x_{M}|^2}$$
where $x_{i} \sim \mathcal{CN}(0,a), \forall i$ and $a > 1$. As can ...
2
votes
1
answer
444
views
Literature question on the convergence rate of the empirical distribution
Assume that given $n$ i.i.d samples $(X_1, X_2, ..., X_n)$ drawn from $p_X$, an unknown probability mass function defined over a finite alphabet $\mathcal{X}$, one wants to estimate $p_X(x)$ for each $...
user83947
2
votes
0
answers
87
views
A complex problem involving densities (likelihood functions) and optimization
Consider the following autoregressive process with normal errors:
\begin{equation}\label{7YlUV4i8nuO}\tag{I}
y_t = \phi y_{t-1}+ u_t, \quad u_t \overset{iid}{\sim} N(0,\sigma^2)
\end{equation}
We ...
- 13
2
votes
0
answers
51
views
MLE and CRLB with mismatched likelihoods
Suppose that I can do a Karhunen-Loeve expansion of a log-likelihood function $p(\bf{x};\theta)$ into N terms and that these accounts for a fraction $1-\delta$ of the total energy. Now consider ...
- 21
2
votes
1
answer
101
views
Estimating mean and variance of a distribution based on error-prone estimates of its cdf
Suppose I have some random variable $X$ taking values in $[a, b]$ with unknown distribution (I am happy to assume the distribution is smooth, though it would be nice to not have to).
I have a ...
- 1,331
1
vote
1
answer
341
views
Form of minimax estimator
Let $\Delta$ be the set of all probability distributions over $\mathbb{N}=\{1,2,\ldots\}$ and fix some $\mathcal{P}\subseteq\Delta$.
Suppose additionally that $\Delta$ is endowed with some norm $||\...
- 6,541
1
vote
1
answer
282
views
Is an unbiased estimator with arbitrarily small variance necessarily consistent?
Given an unbiased estimator $\hat \theta_n$ of a parameter $\theta$, if the estimator has small variance (approaching $0$ as $n\to\infty$), it seems reasonable to expect that the estimator is ...
- 133
1
vote
1
answer
56
views
How to study the convergence of the sample mode for arbitrary probability spaces
(This is not the problem I actually care about, but an analogy with similar issues to the problem I'm actually considering.)
Consider a probability space with i.i.d. random variables $X_i$ producing ...
- 277
1
vote
1
answer
256
views
KL divergence Inequality
I am trying to find a proof for the following inequality, but I did not get anywhere following the references from the paper I was reading.
Consider two probability measures $P$ and $Q$ both ...
- 275
1
vote
1
answer
124
views
Reconstructing the number of distinct elements from a random projection
Assume we have an unknown sequence $x_1,\ldots, x_n\in \mathcal U$.
We get to observe the sequence $h(x_1),h(x_2),\ldots, h(x_n)$, where $h:\mathcal U\to \{1,\ldots, k\}$ is a random function such ...
- 618
1
vote
1
answer
101
views
Estimating the average of two gaussians' mean with minimal squared error
This is a follow-up to my previous question.
Assume that $X\sim \mathcal N(\mu_1,\sigma_1^2)$ and $Y\sim \mathcal N(\mu_2,\sigma_2^2)$.
I want to estimate $\frac{\mu_1+\mu_2}{2}$ after observing $X,Y$....
- 618
1
vote
1
answer
193
views
Fisher information with vanishing probability
I am confused about the definition of the Fisher information and the case when probability is 0. Consider discrete set $\epsilon$ of possible measurement outcomes. Fisher information is defined as:
$$...
- 237
1
vote
0
answers
148
views
conjecture for general form of minimax estimator
I had previously posed an overly ambitious version of this conjecture here,
Form of minimax estimator,
which was quickly shot down by Václav Voráček (on twitter) and Iosif Pinelis (MO answer in the ...
- 6,541
1
vote
0
answers
81
views
Calculating the mean squared error for an estimate of a large sum
Consider the set of all Boolean function $f: \{0, 1\}^{n} \rightarrow \{-1, 1\}$. Now, let's pick a function uniformly at random from this set. Let $F$ be the random variable corresponding to the ...
1
vote
0
answers
75
views
Percentile interval Lemma
Let $\theta$ be a parameter and $\hat{\theta}$ the plug-in estimate, I need a proof of the following lemma, as given in [1], p. 173, in the form of a reference or of a direct argument:
Percentile ...
1
vote
0
answers
154
views
How to retrieve back the input using Bussgang theorem?
If we have a non-linear function $f$, that is applied to input $x$,
we have then the output $y=f(x)$
Using Bussgang decomposition we can linearize this nonlinearity and express $y$ as
$y=Bx+ η$,
...
- 39
1
vote
0
answers
62
views
Distances between up and down crosses in Gaussian Processes
Given a gaussian process $g := \mathcal{GP}\left(\mu, \Sigma \right)$,
where $\mu$ is the mean and $\Sigma$ is the covariance function, I am interested in estimating the mean value $L_m$ of the ...
- 91
1
vote
0
answers
49
views
A question about the prediction error
I am reading about the prediction error estimation and I found the following:
Suppose we have ${\mathbf{Y}}=\mathbf{x}_0+ \epsilon$, where, $\epsilon$ is normally distributed as $\sim \mathcal{N}(0, \...
- 11
1
vote
0
answers
46
views
Equivalence of Graphical model selection algorithms
Suppose, a jointly Gaussian random vector is denoted by $X \in \mathbb{R}^{p}$ and $X$ has a distribution given by $\mathcal{N}(\mu,\Sigma)$. It is known that estimating the graphical model that ...
- 275
1
vote
0
answers
244
views
Distribution of a signal covariance matrix
A common estimation problem in signal processing assumes the following signal model
\begin{equation}
\mathbf{r} = \sum_{i=1}^{Q}\alpha_i\mathbf{s}\left(w_i\right)+\mathbf{n}
\end{equation}
where $\...
- 345
1
vote
0
answers
186
views
Shrinkage (or Stein's phenomenon) in low dimensions, discrete contexts
I am trying to understand shrinkage, or the Stein phenomenon. As someone without a statistics background, the focus in most introductory presentations on normal distributions and squared error loss ...
- 203
0
votes
1
answer
940
views
Derivative of log-likelihood function for Gaussian distribution with parameterized variance
Suppose we have a parameter $\theta \in R^{n}$ that defines some noisy observation $z=\mu(\theta)+\eta, z\in R^{m}$ where the noise follows a Gaussian distribution whose covariance is a function of ...
- 75
0
votes
0
answers
31
views
What is the Fisher information matrix of the von Mises-Fisher distribution?
Assuming the von Mises-Fisher distribution as
$$f_{p}(\mathbf{x}; \boldsymbol{\mu}, \kappa) = C_{p}(\kappa) \exp \left( {\kappa \boldsymbol{\mu}^\mathsf{T} \mathbf{x} } \right),$$
where $\kappa \ge 0$,...
- 287
-1
votes
1
answer
205
views
How to combine estimator with different variances?
Consider independent random variables $X_1,X_2,\ldots,$ that have the same expectation $\mathbb x=\mathbb E[X_1]=\mathbb E[X_2]=\ldots$
Further, assume that we know that $Var[X_i]=\sigma_i^2$.
In the ...
- 127
-2
votes
1
answer
92
views
Existence or impossibility of Gaussian factory
Gaussian factory problem: given an iid sequence $x_i \sim \mathcal{N}(\mu,\sigma^2)$, $i=1,2,\dots$, with $\mu$ and $\sigma^2$ both unknown, construct a realization $y \sim \mathcal{N}(0,1)$.
