Principles Of Nonparametric Learning

This volume provides a systematic in-depth analysis of nonparametric learning. It covers the theoretical limits and the asymptotical optimal algorithms and estimates, such as pattern recognition, nonparametric regression estimation, universal prediction, vector quantization, distribution and density estimation, and genetic programming.

This book provides a systematic in-depth analysis of nonparametric regression with random design. It covers almost all known estimates. The emphasis is on distribution-free properties of the estimates.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 19th Annual Conference on Learning Theory, COLT 2006, held in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA, June 2006. The book presents 43 revised full papers together with 2 articles on open problems and 3 invited lectures. The papers cover a wide range of topics including clustering, un- and semi-supervised learning, statistical learning theory, regularized learning and kernel methods, query learning and teaching, inductive inference, and more.

Machine Learning has become a key enabling technology for many engineering applications, investigating scientific questions and theoretical problems alike. To stimulate discussions and to disseminate new results, a summer school series was started in February 2002, the documentation of which is published as LNAI 2600. This book presents revised lectures of two subsequent summer schools held in 2003 in Canberra, Australia, and in Tübingen, Germany. The tutorial lectures included are devoted to statistical learning theory, unsupervised learning, Bayesian inference, and applications in pattern recognition; they provide in-depth overviews of exciting new developments and contain a large number of references. Graduate students, lecturers, researchers and professionals alike will find this book a useful resource in learning and teaching machine learning.

A thought-provoking look at statistical learning theory and its role in understanding human learning and inductive reasoning A joint endeavor from leading researchers in the fields of philosophy and electrical engineering, An Elementary Introduction to Statistical Learning Theory is a comprehensive and accessible primer on the rapidly evolving fields of statistical pattern recognition and statistical learning theory. Explaining these areas at a level and in a way that is not often found in other books on the topic, the authors present the basic theory behind contemporary machine learning and uniquely utilize its foundations as a framework for philosophical thinking about inductive inference. Promoting the fundamental goal of statistical learning, knowing what is achievable and what is not, this book demonstrates the value of a systematic methodology when used along with the needed techniques for evaluating the performance of a learning system. First, an introduction to machine learning is presented that includes brief discussions of applications such as image recognition, speech recognition, medical diagnostics, and statistical arbitrage. To enhance accessibility, two chapters on relevant aspects of probability theory are provided. Subsequent chapters feature coverage of topics such as the pattern recognition problem, optimal Bayes decision rule, the nearest neighbor rule, kernel rules, neural networks, support vector machines, and boosting. Appendices throughout the book explore the relationship between the discussed material and related topics from mathematics, philosophy, psychology, and statistics, drawing insightful connections between problems in these areas and statistical learning theory. All chapters conclude with a summary section, a set of practice questions, and a reference sections that supplies historical notes and additional resources for further study. An Elementary Introduction to Statistical Learning Theory is an excellent book for courses on statistical learning theory, pattern recognition, and machine learning at the upper-undergraduate and graduate levels. It also serves as an introductory reference for researchers and practitioners in the fields of engineering, computer science, philosophy, and cognitive science that would like to further their knowledge of the topic.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 18th Annual Conference on Learning Theory, COLT 2005, held in Bertinoro, Italy in June 2005. The 45 revised full papers together with three articles on open problems presented were carefully reviewed and selected from a total of 120 submissions. The papers are organized in topical sections on: learning to rank, boosting, unlabeled data, multiclass classification, online learning, support vector machines, kernels and embeddings, inductive inference, unsupervised learning, generalization bounds, query learning, attribute efficiency, compression schemes, economics and game theory, separation results for learning models, and survey and prospects on open problems.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 17th Annual Conference on Learning Theory, COLT 2004, held in Banff, Canada in July 2004. The 46 revised full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from a total of 113 submissions. The papers are organized in topical sections on economics and game theory, online learning, inductive inference, probabilistic models, Boolean function learning, empirical processes, MDL, generalisation, clustering and distributed learning, boosting, kernels and probabilities, kernels and kernel matrices, and open problems.

An applied treatment of the key methods and state-of-the-art tools for visualizing and understanding statistical data Smoothing of Multivariate Data provides an illustrative and hands-on approach to the multivariate aspects of density estimation, emphasizing the use of visualization tools. Rather than outlining the theoretical concepts of classification and regression, this book focuses on the procedures for estimating a multivariate distribution via smoothing. The author first provides an introduction to various visualization tools that can be used to construct representations of multivariate functions, sets, data, and scales of multivariate density estimates. Next, readers are presented with an extensive review of the basic mathematical tools that are needed to asymptotically analyze the behavior of multivariate density estimators, with coverage of density classes, lower bounds, empirical processes, and manipulation of density estimates. The book concludes with an extensive toolbox of multivariate density estimators, including anisotropic kernel estimators, minimization estimators, multivariate adaptive histograms, and wavelet estimators. A completely interactive experience is encouraged, as all examples and figurescan be easily replicated using the R software package, and every chapter concludes with numerous exercises that allow readers to test their understanding of the presented techniques. The R software is freely available on the book's related Web site along with "Code" sections for each chapter that provide short instructions for working in the R environment. Combining mathematical analysis with practical implementations, Smoothing of Multivariate Data is an excellent book for courses in multivariate analysis, data analysis, and nonparametric statistics at the upper-undergraduate and graduatelevels. It also serves as a valuable reference for practitioners and researchers in the fields of statistics, computer science, economics, and engineering.