English

Allowing for imprecision in the game-theoretic characterisation of the Poisson process

Probability 2026-04-02 v1

Abstract

In their 1993 paper 'Forecasting point and continuous processes: Prequential analysis' in Test, Vovk put forward a game-theoretic definition of the Poisson process. A key assumption therein is that the rate of the Poisson process is known or specified exactly. In contrast, I replace this assumption with the less stringent -- and arguably more realistic -- one that the available information about the process takes the form of bounds on the rate rather than a single, exact value. The resulting process has properties similar to the standard, 'precise' Poisson process, albeit with an imprecise flavour to them, thus justifying the moniker 'imprecise Poisson process'.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2604.00598,
  title  = {Allowing for imprecision in the game-theoretic characterisation of the Poisson process},
  author = {Alexander Erreygers},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2604.00598},
  year   = {2026}
}

Comments

Accepted for publication in the proceedings of IPMU 2026