Understanding Aggregations of Proper Learners in Multiclass Classification

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Main Authors: Asilis, Julian, Høgsgaard, Mikael Møller, Velegkas, Grigoris
Format: Preprint
Published: 2024
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author Asilis, Julian
Høgsgaard, Mikael Møller
Velegkas, Grigoris
author_facet Asilis, Julian
Høgsgaard, Mikael Møller
Velegkas, Grigoris
contents Multiclass learnability is known to exhibit a properness barrier: there are learnable classes which cannot be learned by any proper learner. Binary classification faces no such barrier for learnability, but a similar one for optimal learning, which can in general only be achieved by improper learners. Fortunately, recent advances in binary classification have demonstrated that this requirement can be satisfied using aggregations of proper learners, some of which are strikingly simple. This raises a natural question: to what extent can simple aggregations of proper learners overcome the properness barrier in multiclass classification? We give a positive answer to this question for classes which have finite Graph dimension, $d_G$. Namely, we demonstrate that the optimal binary learners of Hanneke, Larsen, and Aden-Ali et al. (appropriately generalized to the multiclass setting) achieve sample complexity $O\left(\frac{d_G + \ln(1 / δ)}ε\right)$. This forms a strict improvement upon the sample complexity of ERM. We complement this with a lower bound demonstrating that for certain classes of Graph dimension $d_G$, majorities of ERM learners require $Ω\left( \frac{d_G + \ln(1 / δ)}ε\right)$ samples. Furthermore, we show that a single ERM requires $Ω\left(\frac{d_G \ln(1 / ε) + \ln(1 / δ)}ε\right)$ samples on such classes, exceeding the lower bound of Daniely et al. (2015) by a factor of $\ln(1 / ε)$. For multiclass learning in full generality -- i.e., for classes of finite DS dimension but possibly infinite Graph dimension -- we give a strong refutation to these learning strategies, by exhibiting a learnable class which cannot be learned to constant error by any aggregation of a finite number of proper learners.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2410_22749
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Understanding Aggregations of Proper Learners in Multiclass Classification
Asilis, Julian
Høgsgaard, Mikael Møller
Velegkas, Grigoris
Machine Learning
Statistics Theory
Multiclass learnability is known to exhibit a properness barrier: there are learnable classes which cannot be learned by any proper learner. Binary classification faces no such barrier for learnability, but a similar one for optimal learning, which can in general only be achieved by improper learners. Fortunately, recent advances in binary classification have demonstrated that this requirement can be satisfied using aggregations of proper learners, some of which are strikingly simple. This raises a natural question: to what extent can simple aggregations of proper learners overcome the properness barrier in multiclass classification? We give a positive answer to this question for classes which have finite Graph dimension, $d_G$. Namely, we demonstrate that the optimal binary learners of Hanneke, Larsen, and Aden-Ali et al. (appropriately generalized to the multiclass setting) achieve sample complexity $O\left(\frac{d_G + \ln(1 / δ)}ε\right)$. This forms a strict improvement upon the sample complexity of ERM. We complement this with a lower bound demonstrating that for certain classes of Graph dimension $d_G$, majorities of ERM learners require $Ω\left( \frac{d_G + \ln(1 / δ)}ε\right)$ samples. Furthermore, we show that a single ERM requires $Ω\left(\frac{d_G \ln(1 / ε) + \ln(1 / δ)}ε\right)$ samples on such classes, exceeding the lower bound of Daniely et al. (2015) by a factor of $\ln(1 / ε)$. For multiclass learning in full generality -- i.e., for classes of finite DS dimension but possibly infinite Graph dimension -- we give a strong refutation to these learning strategies, by exhibiting a learnable class which cannot be learned to constant error by any aggregation of a finite number of proper learners.
title Understanding Aggregations of Proper Learners in Multiclass Classification
topic Machine Learning
Statistics Theory
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2410.22749