论文标题
与不确定模型的分布推理的一般框架
A General Framework for Distributed Inference with Uncertain Models
论文作者
论文摘要
本文研究了分布式分类与异质剂网络的分布问题。代理商寻求共同确定最能描述一系列观察结果的基本目标类别。该问题首先被抽象成一个假设检验框架,在该框架中,我们假设代理商试图就最适合观测值分布的假设(目标类别)达成共识。非拜拜斯社会学习理论提供了一个框架,通过允许代理商在网络上对每个假设进行依次交流和更新其信念,从而以有效的方式解决此问题。大多数现有方法都假定代理可以访问每个假设的确切统计模型。但是,在许多实际应用中,代理基于有限的数据学习了可能性模型,这会引起似然函数参数的不确定性。在这项工作中,我们基于不确定模型的概念,通过识别一组广泛的参数分布,使代理人的信念可以作为集中式方法融合到相同的结果,从而将代理的不确定性纳入了可能性。此外,我们从经验上探索了非参数模型的扩展,以提供非生庭社会学习中不确定模型的广义框架。
This paper studies the problem of distributed classification with a network of heterogeneous agents. The agents seek to jointly identify the underlying target class that best describes a sequence of observations. The problem is first abstracted to a hypothesis-testing framework, where we assume that the agents seek to agree on the hypothesis (target class) that best matches the distribution of observations. Non-Bayesian social learning theory provides a framework that solves this problem in an efficient manner by allowing the agents to sequentially communicate and update their beliefs for each hypothesis over the network. Most existing approaches assume that agents have access to exact statistical models for each hypothesis. However, in many practical applications, agents learn the likelihood models based on limited data, which induces uncertainty in the likelihood function parameters. In this work, we build upon the concept of uncertain models to incorporate the agents' uncertainty in the likelihoods by identifying a broad set of parametric distribution that allows the agents' beliefs to converge to the same result as a centralized approach. Furthermore, we empirically explore extensions to non-parametric models to provide a generalized framework of uncertain models in non-Bayesian social learning.