We consider a weather prediction system in which a single senior predictor predicts a weather probability distribution on the basis of N predictors' prediction results. Below the system is described in details.
There are N weather predictors, each of whom outputs a weather probability distribution once a day. Here the weather is a binary random variable taking a value 1 or 0 only (1 means "fine" while 0 means "not fine"). It is assumed that the weather is independent of a day.
Let the probability distribution that the i-th predictor outputs on the t-th day be Pi(t)(X) (X∈{1,0}) where we let 0<Pi(t)(X)<1 (X∈{1,0}). There is a senior predictor who aggregates the outputs of the N predictors. On the t-th day, the senior predictor takes a weighted average over the probability distributions output by the N predictors to output a weather probability distribution P^(t)(X) (X∈{1,0}). Here the weight on the i-th predictor on the t-th day is denoted as vi(t) (∑i=1Nvi(t)=1,vi(t)>0 (i=1,…,N)). That is, on the t-th day, P^(t)(X) is given by ∑i=1Nvi(t)Pi(t)(X) (see Figure 1).
On the t-th day, after the senior predictor ouputs, the real outcome xt∈{1,0} of the weather on the day is reported. This process goes on sequentially with respect to t.
In the above setting, answer the following questions.
(1) Assume that the senior predictor defines the weight vi(t) of the i-th predictor on the t-th day so that the ratio of vi(t)s with respect to i is equal to that of their corresponding likelihoods with respect to the sequence of the past t−1 data: xt−1=x1…xt−1. That is, when we denote the likelihood of the i-th predictor with respect to xt−1 as wi(t−1),
the following equation holds: For each t,
v1(t):⋯:vN(t)=w1(t−1):⋯:wN(t−1).
The likelihood of the i-th predictor with respect to xt−1 is calculated as wi(t−1)=∏j=1t−1Pi(j)(X=xj), where we denote Pi(j)(X=xj) as Pi(j)(xj) and we set Pi(0)(x0)=1 (i=1,…,N).
In this setting, for each i, show a relation between wi(t) and wi(t−1), and derive a formula for calculating vi(t+1) using wi(t−1) and Pi(t)(xt) (i=1,…,N).
(2) Suppose that the senior predictor predicts the weather probability distribution sequentially with respect to t for T days. Then under the setting of vi(t) as in (1), write an algorithm for the senior predictor to output a weather probability distribution and update the weights for predictors every day, and show the order of its computation time in terms of N and T. Here the initial weight for each predictor is set as follows:
v1(0)=⋯=vN(0)=1/N.
(3) When the prediction is sequentially made for T days, we define the cumulative predictive loss for the senior predictor with respect to the sequence xT=x1…xT of observed real coutcome as follows:
Loss(xT)=∑t=1T(−logP^(t)(xt)).
Then write Loss(xT) as a function of Pi(t)(xt) (i=1,…,N,t=1,…,T) and N. Here the logarithm is the natural logarithm.
(4) Prove that the senior predictor's cumulative loss for T days defined in (3) is at most logN larger than the least cumulative loss over all i-th predictors for T days. Here the cumulative loss for the i-th predictor for T days is defined as ∑t=1T(−logPi(t)(xt)) (i=1,…,N).