Scoring Rules and Calibration for Imprecise Probabilities

Fuente: arXiv
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Autori principali: Fröhlich, Christian, Williamson, Robert C.
Natura: Preprint
Pubblicazione: 2024
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author Fröhlich, Christian
Williamson, Robert C.
author_facet Fröhlich, Christian
Williamson, Robert C.
contents What does it mean to say that, for example, the probability for rain tomorrow is between 20% and 30%? The theory for the evaluation of precise probabilistic forecasts is well-developed and is grounded in the key concepts of proper scoring rules and calibration. For the case of imprecise probabilistic forecasts (sets of probabilities), such theory is still lacking. In this work, we therefore generalize proper scoring rules and calibration to the imprecise case. We develop these concepts as relative to data models and decision problems. As a consequence, the imprecision is embedded in a clear context. We establish a close link to the paradigm of (group) distributional robustness and in doing so provide new insights for it. We argue that proper scoring rules and calibration serve two distinct goals, which are aligned in the precise case, but intriguingly are not necessarily aligned in the imprecise case. The concept of decision-theoretic entropy plays a key role for both goals. Finally, we demonstrate the theoretical insights in machine learning practice, in particular we illustrate subtle pitfalls relating to the choice of loss function in distributional robustness.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2410_23001
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Scoring Rules and Calibration for Imprecise Probabilities
Fröhlich, Christian
Williamson, Robert C.
Machine Learning
Statistics Theory
What does it mean to say that, for example, the probability for rain tomorrow is between 20% and 30%? The theory for the evaluation of precise probabilistic forecasts is well-developed and is grounded in the key concepts of proper scoring rules and calibration. For the case of imprecise probabilistic forecasts (sets of probabilities), such theory is still lacking. In this work, we therefore generalize proper scoring rules and calibration to the imprecise case. We develop these concepts as relative to data models and decision problems. As a consequence, the imprecision is embedded in a clear context. We establish a close link to the paradigm of (group) distributional robustness and in doing so provide new insights for it. We argue that proper scoring rules and calibration serve two distinct goals, which are aligned in the precise case, but intriguingly are not necessarily aligned in the imprecise case. The concept of decision-theoretic entropy plays a key role for both goals. Finally, we demonstrate the theoretical insights in machine learning practice, in particular we illustrate subtle pitfalls relating to the choice of loss function in distributional robustness.
title Scoring Rules and Calibration for Imprecise Probabilities
topic Machine Learning
Statistics Theory
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2410.23001