Related papers: Optimal Monte Carlo Estimation of Belief Network I…

In this paper, we propose a new stochastic optimization algorithm for Bayesian inference based on multilevel Monte Carlo (MLMC) methods. In Bayesian statistics, biased estimators of the model evidence have been often used as stochastic…

By leveraging the natural geometry of a smooth probabilistic system, Hamiltonian Monte Carlo yields computationally efficient Markov Chain Monte Carlo estimation. At least provided that the algorithm is sufficiently well-tuned. In this…

We consider generalizations of the classical inverse problem to Bayesien type estimators, where the result is not one optimal parameter but an optimal probability distribution in parameter space. The practical computational tool to compute…

We propose a randomized version of the non-local means (NLM) algorithm for large-scale image filtering. The new algorithm, called Monte Carlo non-local means (MCNLM), speeds up the classical NLM by computing a small subset of image patch…

We introduce overdispersed black-box variational inference, a method to reduce the variance of the Monte Carlo estimator of the gradient in black-box variational inference. Instead of taking samples from the variational distribution, we use…

In this work, we examine sampling problems with non-smooth potentials. We propose a novel Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithm for sampling from non-smooth potentials. We provide a non-asymptotical analysis of our algorithm and establish a…

We formalize the notion of nesting probabilistic programming queries and investigate the resulting statistical implications. We demonstrate that while query nesting allows the definition of models which could not otherwise be expressed,…

Orthogonal Monte Carlo (OMC) is a very effective sampling algorithm imposing structural geometric conditions (orthogonality) on samples for variance reduction. Due to its simplicity and superior performance as compared to its Quasi Monte…

This paper proposes a new theory and methodology to tackle the problem of unifying distributed analyses and inferences on shared parameters from multiple sources, into a single coherent inference. This surprisingly challenging problem…

Exact approximations of Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithms are a general emerging class of sampling algorithms. One of the main ideas behind exact approximations consists of replacing intractable quantities required to run standard…

Practitioners of Bayesian statistics have long depended on Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) to obtain samples from intractable posterior distributions. Unfortunately, MCMC algorithms are typically serial, and do not scale to the large…

A significant hurdle for analyzing large sample data is the lack of effective statistical computing and inference methods. An emerging powerful approach for analyzing large sample data is subsampling, by which one takes a random subsample…

Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) is one of the main workhorses of probabilistic inference, but it is notoriously hard to measure the quality of approximate posterior samples. This challenge is particularly salient in black box inference…

We study the approximation of $\mathbb{E}f(X_T)$ by a Monte Carlo algorithm, where $X$ is the solution of a stochastic differential equation and $f$ is a given function. We introduce a new variance reduction method, which can be viewed as a…

In this article we consider computing expectations w.r.t.~probability laws associated to a certain class of stochastic systems. In order to achieve such a task, one must not only resort to numerical approximation of the expectation, but…

Estimating the predictive uncertainty of a Bayesian learning model is critical in various decision-making problems, e.g., reinforcement learning, detecting adversarial attack, self-driving car. As the model posterior is almost always…

We introduce and demonstrate a new approach to inference in expressive probabilistic programming languages based on particle Markov chain Monte Carlo. Our approach is simple to implement and easy to parallelize. It applies to…

The Monte Carlo algorithm is increasingly utilized, with its central step involving computer-based random sampling from stochastic models. While both Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) and Reject Monte Carlo serve as sampling methods, the…

Bayesian inference methods such as Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) typically require repeated computations of the likelihood function, but in some scenarios this is infeasible and alternative methods are needed. Simulation-based inference…

Importance sampling is a popular variance reduction method for Monte Carlo estimation, where a notorious question is how to design good proposal distributions. While in most cases optimal (zero-variance) estimators are theoretically…