This Chapter, "Overview of Approximate Bayesian Computation", is to appear as the first chapter in the forthcoming Handbook of Approximate Bayesian Computation (2018). It details the main ideas and concepts behind ABC methods with many examples and illustrations.
The paper proposes using path signatures for better inference in time series data.
problem Simulation models with time series data often lack tractable likelihood functions.
method Approximate Bayesian Computation with path signatures to handle sequential data.
result Theoretical guarantees on the resultant posteriors for Bayesian parameter inference.
Bayesian methods enhance deep learning models by improving reliability and uncertainty.
problem Improving reliability and uncertainty awareness in deep learning models.
method Approximate Bayesian inference techniques, including SG-MCMC and VI, applied to deep learning models.
result Enhanced posterior inference for deep learning models, particularly in neural networks and generative models.
This paper introduces Bayes Hilbert spaces for efficient posterior approximation.
problem Efficient posterior approximation in Bayesian models for large datasets.
method Develops Bayes Hilbert spaces for posterior approximation and connects them to Bayesian coresets and kernel-based distances.
result Bayes Hilbert spaces provide a novel framework for posterior approximation that is computationally efficient.
The paper connects ABC to GBI, suggesting ABC as a robustification strategy.
problem Approximate Bayesian Computation struggles with tractability in complex simulators.
method Reinterpreting ABC as an implicitly defined error model and suggesting GBI.
result ABC can be seen as a robustification strategy for approximating Bayesian posteriors.
Stochastic Volatility in Mean models with heavy-tailed distributions using Hidden Markov Models
problem Accurate inference for Stochastic Volatility in Mean models with heavy-tailed distributions
method Numerically stable estimation procedure and parallel computing
result Significant reduction in computational times
Proposes a new method to approximate Bayesian predictive uncertainty.
problem Bayesian uncertainty quantification in model predictions.
method Self-supervised learning approach to approximate posterior predictive distribution.
result SSLA and ASSLA outperform classical Laplace approximations in predictive calibration.
Bayesian inference typically requires the computation of an approximation to the posterior distribution. An important requirement for an approximate Bayesian inference algorithm is to output high-accuracy posterior mean and uncertainty estimates. Classical Monte Carlo methods, particularly Markov Chain Monte Carlo, rem…
The future predictive performance of a Bayesian model can be estimated using Bayesian cross-validation. In this article, we consider Gaussian latent variable models where the integration over the latent values is approximated using the Laplace method or expectation propagation (EP). We study the properties of several B…
Bayesian Deep Learning tackles inverse problems with neural networks and approximate computations.
problem Solving inverse problems with indirect measurements and uncertainties.
method Bayesian Deep Learning, using neural networks and approximate computations.
result Effective solutions for inverse problems using Bayesian Deep Learning.
New method improves ABC for Bayesian model comparison.
problem Comparing complex models with observed data.
method Approximate Bayesian Computation with posterior density estimation.
result Efficiently assigns high posterior probabilities to ground-truth models.
Proposes TAGI for efficient Gaussian inference in Bayesian neural networks.
problem Efficient inference in Bayesian neural networks with complex architectures.
method Analytical method for tractable approximate Gaussian inference (TAGI).
result Matches performance of gradient-based methods with O(n) computational complexity. Approximate Bayesian computation (ABC) is a method for Bayesian inference when the likelihood is unavailable but simulating from the model is possible. However, many ABC algorithms require a large number of simulations, which can be costly. To reduce the computational cost, Bayesian optimisation (BO) and surrogate mode…
RCaGP improves robustness and computational efficiency in Gaussian processes.
problem Outliers in large datasets corrupt standard Gaussian process models.
method Combines robustness and approximation-awareness in a principled framework.
result Ensures more conservative and reliable uncertainty estimates.
PyVBMC speeds up Bayesian inference for expensive models in Python.
problem Efficient Bayesian inference for computationally expensive models.
method Variational Bayesian Monte Carlo (VBMC) algorithm.
result PyVBMC provides a flexible and efficient method for parameter estimation and model assessment.
New methods improve statistical accuracy of complex models without high computational cost.
problem Improving statistical accuracy of complex models without high computational cost.
method Neural posterior and likelihood estimation (NPE and NLE) methods.
result NPE and NLE methods have similar theoretical guarantees to ABC and BSL, but achieve accuracy at a reduced computational cost.
This paper improves Bayesian inference for predictive models with limited data.
problem Effective uncertainty quantification for training predictive models with limited data.
method Entropy-regularized gradient estimators to approximate the Bayesian posterior.
result The method generates diverse samples from the posterior distribution efficiently.
Paper solves Bayesian bandit problem with continuous-time limit and approximate policy.
problem Finding optimal policy in Bayesian bandit problems with large horizons.
method Reformulates Bayesian bandit problem as continuous Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman (HJB) equation and proposes approximate Bayes-optimal policy.
result Approximate Bayes-optimal policy for large horizons with constant computational cost.
We consider Bayesian inference problems with computationally intensive likelihood functions. We propose a Gaussian process (GP) based method to approximate the joint distribution of the unknown parameters and the data. In particular, we write the joint density approximately as a product of an approximate posterior dens…
Post-process Bayesian inference speeds up posterior approximation.
problem Leveraging pre-existing model evaluations for quick posterior approximation.
method Variational Sparse Bayesian Quadrature (VSBQ) using sparse Gaussian process (GP) surrogate model.
result VSBQ builds high-quality posterior approximations from existing optimization traces.
GACTGAN synthesizes tabular data better with less computational overhead.
problem Synthesizing mixed tabular data while balancing risk and utility.
method Integrates Bayesian posterior approximation with Stochastic Weight Averaging-Gaussian (SWAG) in CTGAN.
result GACTGAN produces better synthetic data with reduced privacy risk.
Latent-IMH improves Bayesian inference for expensive operators.
problem Efficient sampling from posterior distributions in inverse problems with computationally expensive operators.
method Metropolis-Hastings independence sampler using approximate and exact operators.
result Latent-IMH outperforms existing methods in computational efficiency.
QLA improves Bayesian uncertainty estimation for DNNs without increasing computational cost.
problem Overconfident out-of-distribution predictions from DNNs.
method Proposes Quadratic Laplace Approximation (QLA) to improve Bayesian uncertainty quantification.
result QLA yields modest yet consistent uncertainty estimation improvements over Linearized Laplace Approximation (LLA) on five regression datasets.
The idea of computer vision as the Bayesian inverse problem to computer graphics has a long history and an appealing elegance, but it has proved difficult to directly implement. Instead, most vision tasks are approached via complex bottom-up processing pipelines. Here we show that it is possible to write short, simple …
New ABC method improves Bézier simplex fitting for noisy data.
problem Overfitting in Bézier simplex fitting when sample points are not on the Pareto set.
method Extended Bézier simplex model to a probabilistic one and proposed a new learning algorithm based on approximate Bayesian computation (ABC) with Wasserstein distance.
result The new algorithm converges on a finite sample and outperforms deterministic methods on noisy instances.
Improved Bayesian inference via variational approximations of generalized rho-posteriors.
problem Robust Bayesian inference under model misspecification and data contamination.
method Introducing a modified ρ-posterior and using PAC-Bayesian analysis with variational approximations. result Theoretical guarantees for tractable inference with competitive robustness and computational efficiency.
URSABench benchmarks Bayesian methods for deep learning models.
problem Scalability issues in Bayesian inference for deep learning.
method Open-source benchmark suite for assessing approximate Bayesian inference methods.
result Initial results show promise for addressing uncertainty and robustness in deep learning.
The paper proposes using Autoencoders to learn summary statistics for Bayesian inference.
problem Approximating posterior distributions for models with intractable likelihood functions.
method Using Autoencoders to extract summary statistics that retain parameter information and cancel noise.
result The approach effectively learns summary statistics that improve posterior approximation.
This paper examines how neural architectures support amortized Bayesian inference and its performance under varying conditions.
problem Understanding and evaluating amortized inference under signal-to-noise variation and distribution shift.
method Statistical analysis of neural architectures including feedforward networks, Deep Sets, and Transformers.
result Neural architectures support amortized Bayesian inference, offering controlled generalization error and robustness under varying conditions.
While learning the maximum likelihood value of parameters of an undirected graphical model is hard, modelling the posterior distribution over parameters given data is harder. Yet, undirected models are ubiquitous in computer vision and text modelling (e.g. conditional random fields). But where Bayesian approaches for d…
A new method combines ANN and Laplace for fast Bayesian inference in ODE models.
problem Bayesian inference for ODE systems with non-analytical solutions is computationally expensive.
method Hybrid approach using ANN for tractable likelihood and Laplace approximation.
result Effective posterior inference with improved computational cost compared to traditional methods.
Approximate Bayesian inference on the basis of summary statistics is well-suited to complex problems for which the likelihood is either mathematically or computationally intractable. However the methods that use rejection suffer from the curse of dimensionality when the number of summary statistics is increased. Here w…
Bayesian neural networks speed up numerical integration.
problem Scalability of Bayesian quadrature methods.
method Bayesian Stein networks using neural networks and Laplace approximation.
result Orders of magnitude speed-up on benchmark functions and real-world problems.
Traditionally, the field of computational Bayesian statistics has been divided into two main subfields: variational methods and Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC). In recent years, however, several methods have been proposed based on combining variational Bayesian inference and MCMC simulation in order to improve their ov…
Proves FR-NGD optimally approximates evolutionary dynamics and continuous Bayesian inference.
problem Optimizing continuous time replicator equations and continuous Bayesian inference.
method Fisher-Rao natural gradient descent (FR-NGD) and its correspondence with evolutionary dynamics.
result FR-NGD optimally approximates continuous time replicator equations and continuous Bayesian inference.
Proposes DAK model for improved GP computations.
problem Challenges in high-dimensional GP layers in DKL.
method Additive structure and induced prior approximation for GP units.
result Outperforms state-of-the-art DKL methods in regression and classification.
Fast Bayesian inference with adaptable priors for real-time applications.
problem Intractable exact posterior computation limits Bayesian inference's adoption.
method Distribution Transformer architecture that learns mappings between priors and posteriors.
result Significant reduction in computation time from minutes to milliseconds.
Optimizes data acquisition in high-dimensional Bayesian optimization.
problem Suboptimal data acquisition in high-dimensional Bayesian optimization tasks.
method Utility-calibrated variational inference to align approximations with BO goals.
result Optimal data acquisition decisions under a limited computational budget.
The computational efficiency of approximate Bayesian computation (ABC) has been improved by using surrogate models such as Gaussian processes (GP). In one such promising framework the discrepancy between the simulated and observed data is modelled with a GP which is further used to form a model-based estimator for the …
UA-SABI uses surrogates to speed up Bayesian inference for expensive models.
problem Inference for computationally expensive models is slow and uncertain.
method Combines surrogate modeling with Amortized Bayesian Inference (ABI) to propagate uncertainties.
result Reliable, fast, and repeated Bayesian inference for expensive models is achieved.
The paper develops fast Bayesian methods for estimating huge PVARs with competitive forecasts.
problem Computational and statistical issues in estimating PVARs with many parameters.
method Integrated rotated Gaussian approximations, exploiting domestic over international information, and fast approximations for international coefficients.
result Produces competitive forecasts quickly using a huge world economy model.
Gaussian process regression helps approximate Bayesian inverse problems efficiently.
problem Computational intractability of Bayesian posterior distributions in inverse problems.
method Gaussian process regression to build a surrogate model for the likelihood.
result Error between true and approximate posterior can be bounded by weighted L2-norm error between true and approximate likelihood. We present and implement two algorithms for analytic asymptotic evaluation of the marginal likelihood of data given a Bayesian network with hidden nodes. As shown by previous work, this evaluation is particularly hard for latent Bayesian network models, namely networks that include hidden variables, where asymptotic ap…
Novel method reduces costly model evaluations in inference problems.
problem Efficiently approximating complex, costly model integrals.
method Compressed Monte Carlo (CMC) scheme for selecting model evaluations.
result Empirical evidence of method's performance in astronomy and remote sensing.
Bayesian context trees capture complex dependencies in categorical sequences.
problem Complex, long-range dependencies in categorical sequences are not well captured by simple models.
method Parsimonious Bayesian context trees with model-based agglomerative clustering for efficient inference.
result The proposed framework outperforms existing models on real-world data.
The concept of mathematical modeling is widespread across almost all of the fields of contemporary science and engineering. Because of the existing necessity of predictions the behavior of natural phenomena, the researchers develop more and more complex models. However, despite their ability to better forecasting, the …
This thesis disentangles Gauss-Newton and variational approximations in Bayesian deep learning.
problem Understanding the interplay between the Gauss-Newton method and variational approximations in Bayesian deep learning.
method Analysis of the Gauss-Newton method and Laplace/Gaussian variational approximations for neural networks.
result The combination of the Gauss-Newton method with approximate inference can be cast as inference in a linear or Gaussian process model.
Active learning method for ABC statistics selection reduces expert work and improves posterior estimates.
problem Handling intractable likelihood functions in models with domain knowledge.
method Active learning method for selecting summary statistics in ABC.
result Better posterior estimates than existing methods, especially with limited simulation budget.