Related papers: Superconstant Inapproximability of Decision Tree L…
We prove that it is NP-hard to properly PAC learn decision trees with queries, resolving a longstanding open problem in learning theory (Bshouty 1993; Guijarro-Lavin-Raghavan 1999; Mehta-Raghavan 2002; Feldman 2016). While there has been a…
Let $H$ be a fixed graph. The $H$-Transversal problem, given a graph $G$, asks to remove the smallest number of vertices from $G$ so that $G$ does not contain $H$ as a subgraph. While a simple $|V(H)|$-approximation algorithm exists and is…
We establish new hardness results for decision tree optimization problems, adding to a line of work that dates back to Hyafil and Rivest in 1976. We prove, under randomized ETH, superpolynomial lower bounds for two basic problems: given an…
In this note, we establish the hardness of approximation of the problem of computing the minimal size of a $\delta$-sufficient reason for decision trees.
In this experimental study we consider Steiner tree approximations that guarantee a constant approximation of ratio smaller than $2$. The considered greedy algorithms and approaches based on linear programming involve the incorporation of…
Given an $n$-vertex non-negatively real-weighted graph $G$, whose vertices are partitioned into a set of $k$ clusters, a \emph{clustered network design problem} on $G$ consists of solving a given network design optimization problem on $G$,…
We connect the problem of properly PAC learning decision trees to the parameterized Nearest Codeword Problem ($k$-NCP). Despite significant effort by the respective communities, algorithmic progress on both problems has been stuck: the…
Replicability is a fundamental challenge in reinforcement learning (RL), as RL algorithms are empirically observed to be unstable and sensitive to variations in training conditions. To formally address this issue, we study \emph{list…
We consider the problem of actively learning an unknown binary decision tree using only membership queries, a setting in which the learner must reason about a large hypothesis space while maintaining formal guarantees. Rather than…
Inferring a decision tree from a given dataset is one of the classic problems in machine learning. This problem consists of buildings, from a labelled dataset, a tree such that each node corresponds to a class and a path between the tree…
We show that approximating the trace norm contraction coefficient of a quantum channel within a constant factor is NP-hard. Equivalently, this shows that determining the optimal success probability for encoding a bit in a quantum system…
Optimal decision tree (\odt) is a fundamental problem arising in applications such as active learning, entity identification, and medical diagnosis. An instance of \odt is given by $m$ hypotheses, out of which an unknown ``true'' hypothesis…
In this paper, we consider the problem of replicable realizable PAC learning. We construct a particularly hard learning problem and show a sample complexity lower bound with a close to $(\log|H|)^{3/2}$ dependence on the size of the…
We discuss the computational complexity of approximating maximum a posteriori inference in sum-product networks. We first show NP-hardness in trees of height two by a reduction from maximum independent set; this implies non-approximability…
We consider the following generalization of binary search in sorted arrays to tree domains. In each step of the search, an algorithm is querying a vertex $q$, and as a reply, it receives an answer, which either states that $q$ is the…
We find an orientation of a tree with 20 vertices such that the corresponding fixed-template constraint satisfaction problem (CSP) is NP-complete, and prove that for every orientation of a tree with fewer vertices the corresponding CSP can…
Decision-theoretic troubleshooting is one of the areas to which Bayesian networks can be applied. Given a probabilistic model of a malfunctioning man-made device, the task is to construct a repair strategy with minimal expected cost. The…
We consider the task of learning the maximum-likelihood polytree from data. Our first result is a performance guarantee establishing that the optimal branching (or Chow-Liu tree), which can be computed very easily, constitutes a good…
The Steiner Tree problem is a classical problem in combinatorial optimization: the goal is to connect a set $T$ of terminals in a graph $G$ by a tree of minimum size. Karpinski and Zelikovsky (1996) studied the $\delta$-dense version of…
We study how to utilize (possibly erroneous) predictions in a model for computing under uncertainty in which an algorithm can query unknown data. Our aim is to minimize the number of queries needed to solve the minimum spanning tree…