Stable Convergence And Stable Limit Theorems

The authors present a concise but complete exposition of the mathematical theory of stable convergence and give various applications in different areas of probability theory and mathematical statistics to illustrate the usefulness of this concept. Stable convergence holds in many limit theorems of probability theory and statistics – such as the classical central limit theorem – which are usually formulated in terms of convergence in distribution. Originated by Alfred Rényi, the notion of stable convergence is stronger than the classical weak convergence of probability measures. A variety of methods is described which can be used to establish this stronger stable convergence in many limit theorems which were originally formulated only in terms of weak convergence. Naturally, these stronger limit theorems have new and stronger consequences which should not be missed by neglecting the notion of stable convergence. The presentation will be accessible to researchers and advanced students at the master's level with a solid knowledge of measure theoretic probability.

The book deals with Berry-Esseen-type inequalities, asymptotic expansions, non-uniform estimates, U-statistics, and the density problem.

The book concerns limit theorems and laws of large numbers for scaled unionsof independent identically distributed random sets. These results generalizewell-known facts from the theory of extreme values. Limiting distributions (called union-stable) are characterized and found explicitly for many examples of random closed sets. The speed of convergence in the limit theorems for unions is estimated by means of the probability metrics method.It includes the evaluation of distances between distributions of random sets constructed similarly to the well-known distances between distributions of random variables. The techniques include regularly varying functions, topological properties of the space of closed sets, Choquet capacities, convex analysis and multivalued functions. Moreover, the concept of regular variation is elaborated for multivalued (set-valued) functions. Applications of the limit theorems to simulation of random sets, statistical tests, polygonal approximations of compacts, limit theorems for pointwise maxima of random functions are considered. Several open problems are mentioned. Addressed primarily to researchers in the theory of random sets, stochastic geometry and extreme value theory, the book will also be of interest to applied mathematicians working on applications of extremal processes and their spatial counterparts. The book is self-contained, and no familiarity with the theory of random sets is assumed.

This book provides a comprehensive description of a new method of proving the central limit theorem, through the use of apparently unrelated results from information theory. It gives a basic introduction to the concepts of entropy and Fisher information, and collects together standard results concerning their behaviour. It brings together results from a number of research papers as well as unpublished material, showing how the techniques can give a unified view of limit theorems. Contents:Introduction to Information TheoryConvergence in Relative EntropyNon-Identical Variables and Random VectorsDependent Random VariablesConvergence to Stable LawsConvergence on Compact GroupsConvergence to Poisson DistributionFree Random Variables Readership: Graduate students, academics and researchers in probability and statistics. Key Features:Presents surprising, interesting connections between two apparently separate areas of mathematicsWritten by one of the researchers who discovered these connectionsOffers a new way of looking at familiar resultsKeywords:Information Theory;Entropy;Fisher Information;Central Limit Theorem;Probability;Statistics;Convergence of Random VariablesReviews:“This book provides a well-written and motivating introduction to information theory and a detailed description of the current research regarding the connections between central limit theorems and information theory. It is an important reference for many graduate students and researchers in this domain.”Mathematical Reviews

This volume is devoted to the study of asymptotic properties of wide classes of stochastic systems arising in mathematical statistics, percolation theory, statistical physics and reliability theory. Attention is paid not only to positive and negative associations introduced in the pioneering papers by Harris, Lehmann, Esary, Proschan, Walkup, Fortuin, Kasteleyn and Ginibre, but also to new and more general dependence conditions. Naturally, this scope comprises families of independent real-valued random variables. A variety of important results and examples of Markov processes, random measures, stable distributions, Ising ferromagnets, interacting particle systems, stochastic differential equations, random graphs and other models are provided. For such random systems, it is worthwhile to establish principal limit theorems of the modern probability theory (central limit theorem for random fields, weak and strong invariance principles, functional law of the iterated logarithm etc.) and discuss their applications. There are 434 items in the bibliography. The book is self-contained, provides detailed proofs, for reader's convenience some auxiliary results are included in the Appendix (e.g. the classical Hoeffding lemma, basic electric current theory etc.). Contents: Random Systems with Covariance Inequalities; Moment and Maximal Inequalities; Central Limit Theorem; Almost Sure Convergence; Invariance Principles; Law of the Iterated Logarithm; Statistical Applications; Integral Functionals. Readership: Researchers in modern probability and statistics, graduate students and academic staff of the universities.

This is a developing area of modern probability theory, which has applications in many areas. This volume is devoted to the systematic study of results on large deviations in situations where Cramér's condition on the finiteness of exponential moments may not be satisfied