Entropy regularization is commonly used to improve policy optimization in reinforcement learning. It is believed to help with \emph{exploration} by encouraging the selection of more stochastic policies. In this work, we analyze this claim using new visualizations of the optimization landscape based on randomly perturbi…
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48 results for “policy landscape”
Visualizing the Loss Landscape of Actor Critic Methods with Applications in Inventory Optimizationcs.LG
Study visualizes actor-critic loss landscapes for inventory optimization.
problem Difficulties in solving multi-store dynamic inventory control problems.
method Low-dimensional visualizations of actor loss function.
result Loss landscapes favor optimal policies in reinforcement learning.
Deep RL policies share adversarial features across different MDPs.
problem Understanding decision boundaries and loss landscapes in neural policies.
method Investigating similarities in high sensitivity directions across MDPs using Arcade Learning Environment.
result High sensitivity directions for neural policies are correlated across MDPs, suggesting shared non-robust features.
Policy shifts between Trump and Biden impact ESG investments, creating volatility.
problem Dramatic policy shifts between Trump and Biden administrations affect ESG investments.
method Analyzes contrasting policies of Trump and Biden administrations and their impacts on ESG investments.
result Policy changes significantly influence ESG investments, leading to volatility and portfolio reassessment.
Deep RL policies are vulnerable to adversarial perturbations, but vanilla training yields more robust policies.
problem Vulnerability of deep reinforcement learning policies to adversarial perturbations.
method Analysis of deep reinforcement learning policy landscape and comparison of vanilla vs. adversarial training.
result Vanilla training yields more robust policies compared to adversarial training.
We study how the behavior of deep policy gradient algorithms reflects the conceptual framework motivating their development. To this end, we propose a fine-grained analysis of state-of-the-art methods based on key elements of this framework: gradient estimation, value prediction, and optimization landscapes. Our result…
We study the global convergence of policy optimization for finding the Nash equilibria (NE) in zero-sum linear quadratic (LQ) games. To this end, we first investigate the landscape of LQ games, viewing it as a nonconvex-nonconcave saddle-point problem in the policy space. Specifically, we show that despite its nonconve…
Survey of theoretical foundations for policy optimization in control.
problem Understanding the theoretical properties of gradient-based methods in control and reinforcement learning.
method Interdisciplinary review of optimization landscape, convergence, and sample complexity for various control problems.
result Recent theoretical results on stability and robustness in learning-based control.
A large body of animation research focuses on optimization of movement control, either as action sequences or policy parameters. However, as closed-form expressions of the objective functions are often not available, our understanding of the optimization problems is limited. Building on recent work on analyzing neural …
The paper explores learning good policies from past data in large state spaces.
problem Learning good policies from historical data in large state spaces.
method Introduces expressivity assumptions and data coverage for function approximation and algorithmic design.
result A variety of algorithms and their guarantees are presented based on assumptions and desired complexity.
Policy Gradient Converges to the Globally Optimal Policy for Nearly Linear-Quadratic Regulatorscs.LG
Policy gradient converges to globally optimal policy in nearly linear-quadratic systems.
problem Finding optimal policies in nonlinear control systems with partial information.
method Policy gradient algorithm designed for nearly linear-quadratic regulators with small Lipschitz nonlinear components.
result Policy gradient algorithm converges to globally optimal policy with linear rate.
Learning to optimize - the idea that we can learn from data algorithms that optimize a numerical criterion - has recently been at the heart of a growing number of research efforts. One of the most challenging issues within this approach is to learn a policy that is able to optimize over classes of functions that are fa…
New findings show optimization is crucial for OPL in large action spaces.
problem Challenges in optimizing policies for large action spaces in offline contextual bandits.
method Weighed log-likelihood objectives and estimator-aware policy parametrization.
result Simple weighted log-likelihood objectives enjoy better optimization properties and recover competitive policies.
Optimizing Solution-Samplers for Combinatorial Problems: The Landscape of Policy-Gradient Methodscs.LG
New framework analyzes effectiveness of neural network-based combinatorial problem solvers.
problem Analyzing neural network-based methods for combinatorial optimization problems.
method Introducing a theoretical framework to assess the effectiveness of solution-samplers using policy-gradient methods.
result Positive theoretical answer to the existence of expressive, tractable, and benign optimization landscapes for combinatorial problems.
PPO algorithm converges to global optimality in multi-agent reinforcement learning.
problem Designing statistical guarantees for policy optimization methods in multi-agent reinforcement learning.
method Leveraging a multi-agent performance difference lemma, a localized action value function is used as a descent direction for each local policy, leading to a multi-agent PPO algorithm.
result The multi-agent PPO algorithm converges to the globally optimal policy at a sublinear rate under standard regularity conditions.
Double descent found in DRL, improving generalization with model capacity.
problem Generalization in over-parameterized DRL models.
method Actor-Critic framework, Policy Entropy metric.
result Policy Entropy significantly reduces as model capacity increases, indicating improved generalization.
New method tackles rugged optimization landscapes in contact-rich scenarios.
problem Optimization challenges in dynamic environments with deformable objects.
method Combines Bayesian optimization with semi-local 'leaps' for global search.
result Outperforms gradient-based and gradient-free baselines in simulation and real robot experiments.
New methods for evaluating and optimizing policies in offline RL with unobserved confounders.
problem Evaluating and optimizing policies in the presence of unobserved confounders.
method Characterized settings and algorithms for consistent value estimates and lower bounds, with sample complexity guarantees.
result Proved local convergence guarantees for offline policy improvement.
KL-constrained API shows optimization issues and improved with regularization.
problem Optimization issues in KL-constrained API algorithms.
method Comparison of KL divergence as a constraint vs. regularizer, empirical evaluation.
result KL-constrained API is not guaranteed to converge and incurs linear regret.
The transfer of knowledge from one policy to another is an important tool in Deep Reinforcement Learning. This process, referred to as distillation, has been used to great success, for example, by enhancing the optimisation of agents, leading to stronger performance faster, on harder domains [26, 32, 5, 8]. Despite the…
A Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning Framework for Off-Policy Evaluation in Two-sided Marketsstat.ML
A new framework uses multi-agent reinforcement learning for evaluating policies in two-sided markets.
problem Evaluating the effects of different policies in two-sided markets with spatial and temporal interference.
method Introduces a multi-agent reinforcement learning (MARL) framework to address policy evaluation challenges in large-scale fleet management.
result Proposes novel estimators for mean outcomes under different products that are consistent despite high-dimensionality.
Reinforcement learning for embodied agents is a challenging problem. The accumulated reward to be optimized is often a very rugged function, and gradient methods are impaired by many local optimizers. We demonstrate, in an experimental setting, that incorporating an intrinsic reward can smoothen the optimization landsc…
Persistence landscapes map persistence diagrams into a function space, which may often be taken to be a Banach space or even a Hilbert space. In the latter case, it is a feature map and there is an associated kernel. The main advantage of this summary is that it allows one to apply tools from statistics and machine lea…
Reviews recent findings on neural network landscapes.
problem Non-convexity of loss functions causing bad landscapes.
method Rigorous geometric analysis and empirical exploration.
result Wide neural nets may have sub-optimal local minima.
Study uses Bayesian Optimization to analyze noise effects in materials research.
problem Optimizing materials with many variables and experimental noise.
method Batch Bayesian Optimization with synthetic data analysis.
result Noise sensitivity varies by problem landscape, impacting optimization outcomes.
This paper explains tax policy for crypto assets in a rapidly evolving tech landscape.
problem Rapid technological changes in crypto assets create regulatory and tax policy blind spots.
method Explains principles of crypto assets, their technology, and tax issues.
result Tax policies are lagging behind innovation in blockchain and crypto.
We characterize value functions in partially observable MDPs as semi-algebraic sets.
problem Understanding feasible value functions in partially observable Markov decision processes.
method Characterization of feasible value functions as semi-algebraic sets defined by polynomial inequalities.
result The feasible set of value functions in POMDPs is a semi-algebraic set, not a polytope as in MDPs.
The study examines when MAML's objective has a benign landscape.
problem Understanding when MAML's objective landscape is benign.
method Analyzing the landscape of MAML objective on LQR tasks.
result The benign landscape of the MAML objective depends on task similarities.
Local PBO methods improve preferential BO in high-dimensional problems.
problem Efficiently optimizing preferential BO in high-dimensional settings.
method Adapting high-dimensional BO techniques to preferential feedback.
result Local PBO methods reduce cumulative regret compared to global baselines.
Black holes offer insights into machine learning's loss landscapes.
problem Understanding the loss landscape in machine learning.
method Comparing machine learning loss landscapes to black hole entropy.
result Black holes provide an infinite family of potential landscapes with known minima.
Adversarial training makes logistic regression weight loss landscapes sharper.
problem Understanding why adversarial training sharpens the weight loss landscape in logistic regression.
method Theoretical analysis of linear logistic regression model with L2 norm constraints, and experiments on ResNet18.
result Adversarial training sharpens the weight loss landscape in linear logistic regression models.
AWP improves robustness by flattening weight loss landscape.
problem Improving robustness of deep neural networks against adversarial examples.
method Explicitly regularizes the flatness of weight loss landscape through adversarial weight perturbation.
result AWP forms a double-perturbation mechanism in adversarial training, leading to flatter weight loss landscape.
Efficiently infers graph edges from genetic similarity data in landscape genetics.
problem Inferring unknown graph edges from genetic similarity data in a heterogeneous landscape.
method Developed an efficient first-order optimization method to solve the inverse landscape genetics problem.
result Our method provides fast and reliable convergence, significantly outperforming existing heuristics.
Smoothed fitness landscape improves protein optimization.
problem Infeasibility of combinatorially large protein sequence space.
method Formulate protein fitness as a graph signal, smooth using Tikunov regularization, and optimize with Gibbs sampling.
result 2.5 fold fitness improvement over training set.
Researchers improve visualization of neural network loss landscapes.
problem Understanding neural network generalization performance.
method Novel 'jump and retrain' procedure, non-linear dimensionality reduction (PHATE), computational homology.
result Improved visualization and quantification of neural network generalization performance.
Deeper models have a more favorable optimization landscape, making them more robust to noise.
problem Characterizing the effect of depth on the optimization landscape of linear regression models.
method Robust and over-parameterized setting, simple sub-gradient method.
result A simple sub-gradient method converges to a balanced solution that is close to the ground truth and enjoys a flat local landscape.
Machine learning techniques are being increasingly used as flexible non-linear fitting and prediction tools in the physical sciences. Fitting functions that exhibit multiple solutions as local minima can be analysed in terms of the corresponding machine learning landscape. Methods to explore and visualise molecular pot…
A new algorithm learns policies from batch data in hierarchical RL.
problem Learning policies from fixed batches of data without full exploration.
method Modeling RL as a two-player game with a leader-follower structure, proposing StackelbergLearner.
result StackelbergLearner achieves competitive performance in batch RL and real-world datasets.
New sampler tackles complex discrete energy landscapes efficiently.
problem Stagnation in gradient-based discrete samplers for non-convex settings.
method DREXEL sampler with Replica Exchange and Adjusted Metropolis.
result Proves samplers satisfy detailed balance and converge to target distribution.
This study analyzes EU ETS literature trends using bibliometric methods.
problem Understanding the evolving research landscape of EU ETS.
method Bibliometric analysis of Scopus database, focusing on publication trends, themes, influential authors, and journals.
result Notable increase in research activity over two decades, particularly during policy changes and economic events.
Recent analyses of certain gradient descent optimization methods have shown that performance can degrade in some settings - such as with stochasticity or implicit momentum. In deep reinforcement learning (Deep RL), such optimization methods are often used for training neural networks via the temporal difference error o…
We analyze the optimization landscape of α-loss in logistic models.
problem Optimization landscape of α-loss in logistic models.
method Tools from strictly-locally-quasi-convex functions and geometric techniques.
result Evolution of optimization landscape with respect to α.
Study reveals sharp characterisation of local minima in neural network loss landscapes.
problem Characterizing local minima in high-dimensional two-layer ReLU neural networks.
method Exact low-dimensional representation of local minima using summary statistics and link with one-pass SGD dynamics.
result Local minima in overparameterized neural networks form discrete families with varying stability and reachability.
New framework for evaluating ad auctions using stochastic modeling.
problem Challenges in evaluating deterministic ad auctions.
method Repurposed bid landscape model to approximate propensity scores, enabling robust OPE estimators.
result Remarkable alignment with online A/B test results, achieving 92% MDA in CTR prediction.
Experimental fractal landscape dynamics observed in emulsions.
problem Understanding anomalous motions in soft glassy materials.
method Quantitative analysis of oil droplet trajectories in dense emulsions.
result Experimental fractal geometry matches computational model of soft glassy dynamics.
SGD vs quasi-Newton optimization in neural networks: different landscapes, different generalizability.
problem Understanding neural network optimization and generalizability.
method Comparison of stochastic gradient descent (SGD) and quasi-Newton optimization methods using computational tools.
result SGD solutions are separated by lower barriers than quasi-Newton solutions, but quasi-Newton solutions are deeper and more isolated.
Complex energy landscapes in spiked-tensor and simple glassy models: ruggedness, arrangements of local minima and phase transitionscond-mat.dis-nn
We study rough high-dimensional landscapes in which an increasingly stronger preference for a given configuration emerges. Such energy landscapes arise in glass physics and inference. In particular we focus on random Gaussian functions, and on the spiked-tensor model and generalizations. We thoroughly analyze the stati…
Considering the creation of persistence landscape on a parametrized curve and structure of sampling, there exists a random process for which a finite mixture model of persistence landscape (FMMPL) can provide a better description for a given dataset. In this paper, a nonparametric approach for computing integrated mean…