Related papers: Jeffreys priors versus experienced physicist prior…

This paper is concerned with the well known Jeffreys-Lindley paradox. In a Bayesian set up, the so-called paradox arises when a point null hypothesis is tested and an objective prior is sought for the alternative hypothesis. In particular,…

It is a relatively well-known fact that in problems of Bayesian model selection improper priors should, in general, be avoided. In this paper we derive a proper and parsimonious uniform prior for regression coefficients. We then use this…

This introduction to Bayesian statistics presents the main concepts as well as the principal reasons advocated in favour of a Bayesian modelling. We cover the various approaches to prior determination as well as the basis asymptotic…

Full Bayesian posteriors are rarely analytically tractable, which is why real-world Bayesian inference heavily relies on approximate techniques. Approximations generally differ from the true posterior and require diagnostic tools to assess…

The Yule-Simon distribution is usually employed in the analysis of frequency data. As the Bayesian literature, so far, ignored this distribution, here we show the derivation of two objective priors for the parameter of the Yule-Simon…

A substantial school in the philosophy of science identifies Bayesian inference with inductive inference and even rationality as such, and seems to be strengthened by the rise and practical success of Bayesian statistics. We argue that the…

The prior distribution for the unknown model parameters plays a crucial role in the process of statistical inference based on Bayesian methods. However, specifying suitable priors is often difficult even when detailed prior knowledge is…

In statistical practice, whether a Bayesian or frequentist approach is used in inference depends not only on the availability of prior information but also on the attitude taken toward partial prior information, with frequentists tending to…

In many hypothesis testing applications, we have mixed priors, with well-motivated informative priors for some parameters but not for others. The Bayesian methodology uses the Bayes factor and is helpful for the informative priors, as it…

I consider the "Quantum Bayesian" view of quantum theory as expounded in a 2006 paper of Caves, Fuchs, and Schack. I argue that one can accept a generally personalist, decision-theoretic view of probability, including probability as…

Bayes factors are characterized by both the powerful mathematical framework of Bayesian statistics and the useful interpretation as evidence quantification. Former requires a parameter distribution that changes by seeing the data, latter…

We consider the Jeffreys-Lindley paradox from an objective Bayesian perspective by attempting to find priors representing complete indifference to sample size in the problem. This means that we ensure that the prior for the unknown mean and…

When performing Bayesian inference, we frequently need to work with conditional probability densities. For example, the posterior function is the conditional density of the parameters given the data. Some might worry that conditional…

We propose a principled framework for nonparametric empirical Bayes (EB) estimation, based on the idea that the prior should be consistent with the observed posterior and that Bayesian updating should be stable. Focusing on discretized…

A common concern with Bayesian methodology in scientific contexts is that inferences can be heavily influenced by subjective biases. As presented here, there are two types of bias for some quantity of interest: bias against and bias in…

Physicists have, hitherto, mostly adopted a frequentist conception of probability, according to which probability statements apply only to ensembles. It is argued that we should, instead, adopt an epistemic, or Bayesian conception, in which…

Prior probabilities of clinical hypotheses are not systematically used for clinical trial design yet, due to a concern that poor priors may lead to poor decisions. To address this concern, a conservative approach to Bayesian trial design is…

For in vivo research experiments with small sample sizes and available historical data, we propose a sequential Bayesian method for the Behrens-Fisher problem. We consider it as a model choice question with two models in competition: one…

We review common situations in Bayesian latent variable models where the prior distribution that a researcher specifies differs from the prior distribution used during estimation. These situations can arise from the positive definite…

The main object of Bayesian statistical inference is the determination of posterior distributions. Sometimes these laws are given for quantities devoid of empirical value. This serious drawback vanishes when one confines oneself to…