Related papers: Nice Bounds for the Generalized Ballot Problem

We examine a generalization of the binomial distribution associated with a strictly increasing sequence of numbers and we prove its Poisson-like limit. Such generalizations might be found in quantum optics with imperfect detection. We…

Let $K\geq 2$ be a natural number and $a_i,b_i\in\mathbb{Z}$ for $i=1,\ldots,K-1$. We use the large sieve to derive explicit upper bounds for the number of prime $k$-tuplets, i.e., for the number of primes $p\leq x$ for which all $a_ip+b_i$…

We consider the occupancy problem where balls are thrown independently at infinitely many boxes with fixed positive frequencies. It is well known that the random number of boxes occupied by the first n balls is asymptotically normal if its…

This paper studies Ebert's hat problem for three and four players and two colors, where the probabilities of the colors may be different for each player. Our goal is to maximize the probability of winning the game and to describe winning…

In this paper we present a new bound obtained with the probabilistic method for the solution of the Set Covering problem with unit costs. The bound is valid for problems of fixed dimension, thus extending previous similar asymptotic…

We derive two probabilistic bounds for the relative forward error in the floating point summation of $n$ real numbers, by representing the roundoffs as independent, zero-mean, bounded random variables. The first probabilistic bound is based…

Let $X$ be a random variable with distribution function $F,$ and $X_{1},X_{2},...,X_{n}$ are independent copies of $X.$ Consider the order statistics $X_{i:n},$ $i=1,2,...,n$ and denote $F_{i:n}(x)=P\{X_{i:n}\leq x\}.$ Using majorization…

We derive a general upper bound for the number of incidences with $k$-dimensional varieties in ${\mathbb R}^d$. The leading term of this new bound generalizes previous bounds for the special cases of $k=1, k=d-1,$ and $k= d/2$, to every…

Election rules are formal processes that aggregate voters preferences, typically to select a single candidate, called the winner. Most of the election rules studied in the literature require the voters to rank the candidates from the most…

We study the computability of the operator norm of a matrix with respect to norms induced by linear operators. Our findings reveal that this problem can be solved exactly in polynomial time in certain situations, and we discuss how it can…

Goemans and Williamson proposed a randomized rounding algorithm for the MAX-CUT problem with a 0.878 approximation bound in expectation. The 0.878 approximation bound remains the best-known approximation bound for this APX-hard problem.…

Voting is a simple mechanism to aggregate the preferences of agents. Many voting rules have been shown to be NP-hard to manipulate. However, a number of recent theoretical results suggest that this complexity may only be in the worst-case…

The Possible Winner problem asks, given an election where the voters' preferences over the candidates are specified only partially, whether a designated candidate can become a winner by suitably extending all the votes. Betzler and Dorn [1]…

A new notion of typicality for arbitrary probability measures on standard Borel spaces is proposed, which encompasses the classical notions of weak and strong typicality as special cases. Useful lemmas about strong typical sets, including…

Social networks are increasingly being used to conduct polls. We introduce a simple model of such social polling. We suppose agents vote sequentially, but the order in which agents choose to vote is not necessarily fixed. We also suppose…

We collect, survey and develop methods of (one-dimensional) stochastic approximation in a framework that seems suitable to handle fairly broad generalizations of Polya urns. To show the applicability of the results we determine the limiting…

Integrity of elections is vital to democratic systems, but it is frequently threatened by malicious actors. The study of algorithmic complexity of the problem of manipulating election outcomes by changing its structural features is known as…

We consider election scenarios with incomplete information, a situation that arises often in practice. There are several models of incomplete information and accordingly, different notions of outcomes of such elections. In one well-studied…

In this paper, some inequalities of bounds for the Neuman-S\'{a}ndor mean in terms of weighted arithmetic means of two bivariate means are established. Bounds involving weighted arithmetic means are sharp.

In perpetual voting, multiple decisions are made at different moments in time. Taking the history of previous decisions into account allows us to satisfy properties such as proportionality over periods of time. In this paper, we consider…