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This survey gives an overview of Monte Carlo methodologies using surrogate models, for dealing with densities which are intractable, costly, and/or noisy. This type of problem can be found in numerous real-world scenarios, including stochastic optimization and reinforcement learning, where each evaluation of a density function may incur some computationally-expensive or even physical (real-world activity) cost, likely to give different results each time. The surrogate model does not incur this cost, but there are important trade-offs and considerations involved in the choice and design of such methodologies. We classify the different methodologies into three main classes and describe specific instances of algorithms under a unified notation. A modular scheme which encompasses the considered methods is also presented. A range of application scenarios is discussed, with special attention to the likelihood-free setting and reinforcement learning. Several numerical comparisons are also provided.
In this paper, we study the asymptotic variance of sample path averages for inhomogeneous Markov chains that evolve alternatingly according to two different $pi$-reversible Markov transition kernels $P$ and $Q$. More specifically, our main result all
This is the solution manual to the odd-numbered exercises in our book Introducing Monte Carlo Methods with R, published by Springer Verlag on December 10, 2009, and made freely available to everyone.
Active Reinforcement Learning (ARL) is a twist on RL where the agent observes reward information only if it pays a cost. This subtle change makes exploration substantially more challenging. Powerful principles in RL like optimism, Thompson sampling,
We propose approaches for testing implementations of Markov Chain Monte Carlo methods as well as of general Monte Carlo methods. Based on statistical hypothesis tests, these approaches can be used in a unit testing framework to, for example, check if
Functional data registration is a necessary processing step for many applications. The observed data can be inherently noisy, often due to measurement error or natural process uncertainty, which most functional alignment methods cannot handle. A pair