We investigate implicit regularization schemes for gradient descent methods applied to unpenalized least squares regression to solve the problem of reconstructing a sparse signal from an underdetermined system of linear …
We investigate implicit regularization schemes for gradient descent methods applied to unpenalized least squares regression to solve the problem of reconstructing a sparse signal from an underdetermined system of linear measurements under the restricted isometry assumption. For a given parametrization yielding a non-convex optimization problem, we show that prescribed choices of initialization, step size and stopping time yield a statistically and computationally optimal algorithm that achieves the minimax rate with the same cost required to read the data up to poly-logarithmic factors. Beyond minimax optimality, we show that our algorithm adapts to instance difficulty and yields a dimension-independent rate when the signal-to-noise ratio is high enough. Key to the computational efficiency of our method is an increasing step size scheme that adapts to refined estimates of the true solution. We validate our findings with numerical experiments and compare our algorithm against explicit $\ell_{1}$ penalization. Going from hard instances to easy ones, our algorithm is seen to undergo a phase transition, eventually matching least squares with an oracle knowledge of the true support.
We investigate implicit regularization schemes for gradient descent methods applied to unpenalized least squares regression to solve the problem of reconstructing a sparse signal from an underdetermined system of linear …
We investigate implicit regularization schemes for gradient descent methods applied to unpenalized least squares regression to solve the problem of reconstructing a sparse signal from an underdetermined system of linear measurements under the restricted isometry assumption. For a given parametrization yielding a non-convex optimization problem, we show that prescribed choices of initialization, step size and stopping time yield a statistically and computationally optimal algorithm that achieves the minimax rate with the same cost required to read the data up to poly-logarithmic factors. Beyond minimax optimality, we show that our algorithm adapts to instance difficulty and yields a dimension-independent rate when the signal-to-noise ratio is high enough. Key to the computational efficiency of our method is an increasing step size scheme that adapts to refined estimates of the true solution. We validate our findings with numerical experiments and compare our algorithm against explicit $\ell_{1}$ penalization. Going from hard instances to easy ones, our algorithm is seen to undergo a phase transition, eventually matching least squares with an oracle knowledge of the true support.
We study random design linear regression with no assumptions on the distribution of the covariates and with a heavy-tailed response variable. In this distribution-free regression setting, we show that boundedness …
We study random design linear regression with no assumptions on the distribution of the covariates and with a heavy-tailed response variable. In this distribution-free regression setting, we show that boundedness of the conditional second moment of the response given the covariates is a necessary and sufficient condition for achieving nontrivial guarantees. As a starting point, we prove an optimal version of the classical in-expectation bound for the truncated least squares estimator due to Gy\"{o}rfi, Kohler, Krzy\.{z}ak, and Walk. However, we show that this procedure fails with constant probability for some distributions despite its optimal in-expectation performance. Then, combining the ideas of truncated least squares, median-of-means procedures, and aggregation theory, we construct a non-linear estimator achieving excess risk of order $d/n$ with an optimal sub-exponential tail. While existing approaches to linear regression for heavy-tailed distributions focus on proper estimators that return linear functions, we highlight that the improperness of our procedure is necessary for attaining nontrivial guarantees in the distribution-free setting.
We study the problem of predicting as well as the best linear predictor in a bounded Euclidean ball with respect to the squared loss. When only boundedness of the data …
We study the problem of predicting as well as the best linear predictor in a bounded Euclidean ball with respect to the squared loss. When only boundedness of the data generating distribution is assumed, we establish that the least squares estimator constrained to a bounded Euclidean ball does not attain the classical O(d∕n) excess risk rate, where d is the dimension of the covariates and n is the number of samples. In particular, we construct a bounded distribution such that the constrained least squares estimator incurs an excess risk of order Ω(d3∕2∕n) hence refuting a recent conjecture of Ohad Shamir [JMLR 2015]. In contrast, we observe that non-linear predictors can achieve the optimal rate O(d∕n) with no assumptions on the distribution of the covariates. We discuss additional distributional assumptions sufficient to guarantee an O(d∕n) excess risk rate for the least squares estimator. Among them are certain moment equivalence assumptions often used in the robust statistics literature. While such assumptions are central in the analysis of unbounded and heavy-tailed settings, our work indicates that in some cases, they also rule out unfavorable bounded distributions.
Recently there has been a surge of interest in understanding implicit regularization properties of iterative gradient-based optimization algorithms. In this paper, we study the statistical guarantees on the excess risk …
Recently there has been a surge of interest in understanding implicit regularization properties of iterative gradient-based optimization algorithms. In this paper, we study the statistical guarantees on the excess risk achieved by early-stopped unconstrained mirror descent algorithms applied to the unregularized empirical risk with the squared loss for linear models and kernel methods. By completing an inequality that characterizes convexity for the squared loss, we identify an intrinsic link between offset Rademacher complexities and potential-based convergence analysis of mirror descent methods. Our observation immediately yields excess risk guarantees for the path traced by the iterates of mirror descent in terms of offset complexities of certain function classes depending only on the choice of the mirror map, initialization point, step-size, and the number of iterations. We apply our theory to recover, in a clean and elegant manner via rather short proofs, some of the recent results in the implicit regularization literature, while also showing how to improve upon them in some settings.
We investigate implicit regularization schemes for gradient descent methods applied to unpenalized least squares regression to solve the problem of reconstructing a sparse signal from an underdetermined system of linear …
We investigate implicit regularization schemes for gradient descent methods applied to unpenalized least squares regression to solve the problem of reconstructing a sparse signal from an underdetermined system of linear measurements under the restricted isometry assumption. For a given parametrization yielding a non-convex optimization problem, we show that prescribed choices of initialization, step size and stopping time yield a statistically and computationally optimal algorithm that achieves the minimax rate with the same cost required to read the data up to poly-logarithmic factors. Beyond minimax optimality, we show that our algorithm adapts to instance difficulty and yields a dimension-independent rate when the signal-to-noise ratio is high enough. Key to the computational efficiency of our method is an increasing step size scheme that adapts to refined estimates of the true solution. We validate our findings with numerical experiments and compare our algorithm against explicit $\ell_{1}$ penalization. Going from hard instances to easy ones, our algorithm is seen to undergo a phase transition, eventually matching least squares with an oracle knowledge of the true support.
We study the problem of predicting as well as the best linear predictor in a bounded Euclidean ball with respect to the squared loss. When only boundedness of the data …
We study the problem of predicting as well as the best linear predictor in a bounded Euclidean ball with respect to the squared loss. When only boundedness of the data generating distribution is assumed, we establish that the least squares estimator constrained to a bounded Euclidean ball does not attain the classical $O(d/n)$ excess risk rate, where $d$ is the dimension of the covariates and $n$ is the number of samples. In particular, we construct a bounded distribution such that the constrained least squares estimator incurs an excess risk of order $\Omega(d^{3/2}/n)$ hence refuting a recent conjecture of Ohad Shamir [JMLR 2015]. In contrast, we observe that non-linear predictors can achieve the optimal rate $O(d/n)$ with no assumptions on the distribution of the covariates. We discuss additional distributional assumptions sufficient to guarantee an $O(d/n)$ excess risk rate for the least squares estimator. Among them are certain moment equivalence assumptions often used in the robust statistics literature. While such assumptions are central in the analysis of unbounded and heavy-tailed settings, our work indicates that in some cases, they also rule out unfavorable bounded distributions.
Abstract Recently there has been a surge of interest in understanding implicit regularization properties of iterative gradient-based optimization algorithms. In this paper, we study the statistical guarantees on the excess …
Abstract Recently there has been a surge of interest in understanding implicit regularization properties of iterative gradient-based optimization algorithms. In this paper, we study the statistical guarantees on the excess risk achieved by early-stopped unconstrained mirror descent algorithms applied to the unregularized empirical risk. We consider the set-up of learning linear models and kernel methods for strongly convex and Lipschitz loss functions while imposing only boundedness conditions on the unknown data-generating mechanism. By completing an inequality that characterizes convexity for the squared loss, we identify an intrinsic link between offset Rademacher complexities and potential-based convergence analysis of mirror descent methods. Our observation immediately yields excess risk guarantees for the path traced by the iterates of mirror descent in terms of offset complexities of certain function classes depending only on the choice of the mirror map, initialization point, step size and the number of iterations. We apply our theory to recover, in a clean and elegant manner via rather short proofs, some of the recent results in the implicit regularization literature while also showing how to improve upon them in some settings.
The local Rademacher complexity framework is one of the most successful general-purpose toolboxes for establishing sharp excess risk bounds for statistical estimators based on the framework of empirical risk minimization. …
The local Rademacher complexity framework is one of the most successful general-purpose toolboxes for establishing sharp excess risk bounds for statistical estimators based on the framework of empirical risk minimization. Applying this toolbox typically requires using the Bernstein condition, which often restricts applicability to convex and proper settings. Recent years have witnessed several examples of problems where optimal statistical performance is only achievable via non-convex and improper estimators originating from aggregation theory, including the fundamental problem of model selection. These examples are currently outside of the reach of the classical localization theory. In this work, we build upon the recent approach to localization via offset Rademacher complexities, for which a general high-probability theory has yet to be established. Our main result is an exponential-tail excess risk bound expressed in terms of the offset Rademacher complexity that yields results at least as sharp as those obtainable via the classical theory. However, our bound applies under an estimator-dependent geometric condition (the "offset condition") instead of the estimator-independent (but, in general, distribution-dependent) Bernstein condition on which the classical theory relies. Our results apply to improper prediction regimes not directly covered by the classical theory.
In the problem of aggregation, the aim is to combine a given class of base predictors to achieve predictions nearly as accurate as the best one. In this flexible framework, …
In the problem of aggregation, the aim is to combine a given class of base predictors to achieve predictions nearly as accurate as the best one. In this flexible framework, no assumption is made on the structure of the class or the nature of the target. Aggregation has been studied in both sequential and statistical contexts. Despite some important differences between the two problems, the classical results in both cases feature the same global complexity measure. In this paper, we revisit and tighten classical results in the theory of aggregation in the statistical setting by replacing the global complexity with a smaller, local one. Some of our proofs build on the PAC-Bayes localization technique introduced by Catoni. Among other results, we prove localized versions of the classical bound for the exponential weights estimator due to Leung and Barron and deviation-optimal bounds for the Q-aggregation estimator. These bounds improve over the results of Dai, Rigollet and Zhang for fixed design regression and the results of Lecu\'e and Rigollet for random design regression.
We study the computation of doubly regularized Wasserstein barycenters, a recently introduced family of entropic barycenters governed by inner and outer regularization strengths. Previous research has demonstrated that various regularization …
We study the computation of doubly regularized Wasserstein barycenters, a recently introduced family of entropic barycenters governed by inner and outer regularization strengths. Previous research has demonstrated that various regularization parameter choices unify several notions of entropy-penalized barycenters while also revealing new ones, including a special case of debiased barycenters. In this paper, we propose and analyze an algorithm for computing doubly regularized Wasserstein barycenters. Our procedure builds on damped Sinkhorn iterations followed by exact maximization/minimization steps and guarantees convergence for any choice of regularization parameters. An inexact variant of our algorithm, implementable using approximate Monte Carlo sampling, offers the first non-asymptotic convergence guarantees for approximating Wasserstein barycenters between discrete point clouds in the free-support/grid-free setting.
We study the convergence rate of Sinkhorn's algorithm for solving entropy-regularized optimal transport problems when at least one of the probability measures, $\mu$, admits a density over $\mathbb{R}^d$. For a …
We study the convergence rate of Sinkhorn's algorithm for solving entropy-regularized optimal transport problems when at least one of the probability measures, $\mu$, admits a density over $\mathbb{R}^d$. For a semi-concave cost function bounded by $c_{\infty}$ and a regularization parameter $\lambda > 0$, we obtain exponential convergence guarantees on the dual sub-optimality gap with contraction rate polynomial in $\lambda/c_{\infty}$. This represents an exponential improvement over the known contraction rate $1 - \Theta(\exp(-c_{\infty}/\lambda))$ achievable via Hilbert's projective metric. Specifically, we prove a contraction rate value of $1-\Theta(\lambda^2/c_\infty^2)$ when $\mu$ has a bounded log-density. In some cases, such as when $\mu$ is log-concave and the cost function is $c(x,y)=-\langle x, y \rangle$, this rate improves to $1-\Theta(\lambda/c_\infty)$. The latter rate matches the one that we derive for the transport between isotropic Gaussian measures, indicating tightness in the dependency in $\lambda/c_\infty$. Our results are fully non-asymptotic and explicit in all the parameters of the problem.
We study the convergence rate of Sinkhorn's algorithm for solving entropy-regularized optimal transport problems when at least one of the probability measures, $\mu$, admits a density over $\mathbb{R}^d$. For a …
We study the convergence rate of Sinkhorn's algorithm for solving entropy-regularized optimal transport problems when at least one of the probability measures, $\mu$, admits a density over $\mathbb{R}^d$. For a semi-concave cost function bounded by $c_{\infty}$ and a regularization parameter $\lambda > 0$, we obtain exponential convergence guarantees on the dual sub-optimality gap with contraction rate polynomial in $\lambda/c_{\infty}$. This represents an exponential improvement over the known contraction rate $1 - \Theta(\exp(-c_{\infty}/\lambda))$ achievable via Hilbert's projective metric. Specifically, we prove a contraction rate value of $1-\Theta(\lambda^2/c_\infty^2)$ when $\mu$ has a bounded log-density. In some cases, such as when $\mu$ is log-concave and the cost function is $c(x,y)=-\langle x, y \rangle$, this rate improves to $1-\Theta(\lambda/c_\infty)$. The latter rate matches the one that we derive for the transport between isotropic Gaussian measures, indicating tightness in the dependency in $\lambda/c_\infty$. Our results are fully non-asymptotic and explicit in all the parameters of the problem.
Abstract Recently there has been a surge of interest in understanding implicit regularization properties of iterative gradient-based optimization algorithms. In this paper, we study the statistical guarantees on the excess …
Abstract Recently there has been a surge of interest in understanding implicit regularization properties of iterative gradient-based optimization algorithms. In this paper, we study the statistical guarantees on the excess risk achieved by early-stopped unconstrained mirror descent algorithms applied to the unregularized empirical risk. We consider the set-up of learning linear models and kernel methods for strongly convex and Lipschitz loss functions while imposing only boundedness conditions on the unknown data-generating mechanism. By completing an inequality that characterizes convexity for the squared loss, we identify an intrinsic link between offset Rademacher complexities and potential-based convergence analysis of mirror descent methods. Our observation immediately yields excess risk guarantees for the path traced by the iterates of mirror descent in terms of offset complexities of certain function classes depending only on the choice of the mirror map, initialization point, step size and the number of iterations. We apply our theory to recover, in a clean and elegant manner via rather short proofs, some of the recent results in the implicit regularization literature while also showing how to improve upon them in some settings.
In the problem of aggregation, the aim is to combine a given class of base predictors to achieve predictions nearly as accurate as the best one. In this flexible framework, …
In the problem of aggregation, the aim is to combine a given class of base predictors to achieve predictions nearly as accurate as the best one. In this flexible framework, no assumption is made on the structure of the class or the nature of the target. Aggregation has been studied in both sequential and statistical contexts. Despite some important differences between the two problems, the classical results in both cases feature the same global complexity measure. In this paper, we revisit and tighten classical results in the theory of aggregation in the statistical setting by replacing the global complexity with a smaller, local one. Some of our proofs build on the PAC-Bayes localization technique introduced by Catoni. Among other results, we prove localized versions of the classical bound for the exponential weights estimator due to Leung and Barron and deviation-optimal bounds for the Q-aggregation estimator. These bounds improve over the results of Dai, Rigollet and Zhang for fixed design regression and the results of Lecu\'e and Rigollet for random design regression.
We study the computation of doubly regularized Wasserstein barycenters, a recently introduced family of entropic barycenters governed by inner and outer regularization strengths. Previous research has demonstrated that various regularization …
We study the computation of doubly regularized Wasserstein barycenters, a recently introduced family of entropic barycenters governed by inner and outer regularization strengths. Previous research has demonstrated that various regularization parameter choices unify several notions of entropy-penalized barycenters while also revealing new ones, including a special case of debiased barycenters. In this paper, we propose and analyze an algorithm for computing doubly regularized Wasserstein barycenters. Our procedure builds on damped Sinkhorn iterations followed by exact maximization/minimization steps and guarantees convergence for any choice of regularization parameters. An inexact variant of our algorithm, implementable using approximate Monte Carlo sampling, offers the first non-asymptotic convergence guarantees for approximating Wasserstein barycenters between discrete point clouds in the free-support/grid-free setting.
We study the problem of predicting as well as the best linear predictor in a bounded Euclidean ball with respect to the squared loss. When only boundedness of the data …
We study the problem of predicting as well as the best linear predictor in a bounded Euclidean ball with respect to the squared loss. When only boundedness of the data generating distribution is assumed, we establish that the least squares estimator constrained to a bounded Euclidean ball does not attain the classical O(d∕n) excess risk rate, where d is the dimension of the covariates and n is the number of samples. In particular, we construct a bounded distribution such that the constrained least squares estimator incurs an excess risk of order Ω(d3∕2∕n) hence refuting a recent conjecture of Ohad Shamir [JMLR 2015]. In contrast, we observe that non-linear predictors can achieve the optimal rate O(d∕n) with no assumptions on the distribution of the covariates. We discuss additional distributional assumptions sufficient to guarantee an O(d∕n) excess risk rate for the least squares estimator. Among them are certain moment equivalence assumptions often used in the robust statistics literature. While such assumptions are central in the analysis of unbounded and heavy-tailed settings, our work indicates that in some cases, they also rule out unfavorable bounded distributions.
We study random design linear regression with no assumptions on the distribution of the covariates and with a heavy-tailed response variable. In this distribution-free regression setting, we show that boundedness …
We study random design linear regression with no assumptions on the distribution of the covariates and with a heavy-tailed response variable. In this distribution-free regression setting, we show that boundedness of the conditional second moment of the response given the covariates is a necessary and sufficient condition for achieving nontrivial guarantees. As a starting point, we prove an optimal version of the classical in-expectation bound for the truncated least squares estimator due to Gy\"{o}rfi, Kohler, Krzy\.{z}ak, and Walk. However, we show that this procedure fails with constant probability for some distributions despite its optimal in-expectation performance. Then, combining the ideas of truncated least squares, median-of-means procedures, and aggregation theory, we construct a non-linear estimator achieving excess risk of order $d/n$ with an optimal sub-exponential tail. While existing approaches to linear regression for heavy-tailed distributions focus on proper estimators that return linear functions, we highlight that the improperness of our procedure is necessary for attaining nontrivial guarantees in the distribution-free setting.
The local Rademacher complexity framework is one of the most successful general-purpose toolboxes for establishing sharp excess risk bounds for statistical estimators based on the framework of empirical risk minimization. …
The local Rademacher complexity framework is one of the most successful general-purpose toolboxes for establishing sharp excess risk bounds for statistical estimators based on the framework of empirical risk minimization. Applying this toolbox typically requires using the Bernstein condition, which often restricts applicability to convex and proper settings. Recent years have witnessed several examples of problems where optimal statistical performance is only achievable via non-convex and improper estimators originating from aggregation theory, including the fundamental problem of model selection. These examples are currently outside of the reach of the classical localization theory. In this work, we build upon the recent approach to localization via offset Rademacher complexities, for which a general high-probability theory has yet to be established. Our main result is an exponential-tail excess risk bound expressed in terms of the offset Rademacher complexity that yields results at least as sharp as those obtainable via the classical theory. However, our bound applies under an estimator-dependent geometric condition (the "offset condition") instead of the estimator-independent (but, in general, distribution-dependent) Bernstein condition on which the classical theory relies. Our results apply to improper prediction regimes not directly covered by the classical theory.
We study the problem of predicting as well as the best linear predictor in a bounded Euclidean ball with respect to the squared loss. When only boundedness of the data …
We study the problem of predicting as well as the best linear predictor in a bounded Euclidean ball with respect to the squared loss. When only boundedness of the data generating distribution is assumed, we establish that the least squares estimator constrained to a bounded Euclidean ball does not attain the classical $O(d/n)$ excess risk rate, where $d$ is the dimension of the covariates and $n$ is the number of samples. In particular, we construct a bounded distribution such that the constrained least squares estimator incurs an excess risk of order $\Omega(d^{3/2}/n)$ hence refuting a recent conjecture of Ohad Shamir [JMLR 2015]. In contrast, we observe that non-linear predictors can achieve the optimal rate $O(d/n)$ with no assumptions on the distribution of the covariates. We discuss additional distributional assumptions sufficient to guarantee an $O(d/n)$ excess risk rate for the least squares estimator. Among them are certain moment equivalence assumptions often used in the robust statistics literature. While such assumptions are central in the analysis of unbounded and heavy-tailed settings, our work indicates that in some cases, they also rule out unfavorable bounded distributions.
Recently there has been a surge of interest in understanding implicit regularization properties of iterative gradient-based optimization algorithms. In this paper, we study the statistical guarantees on the excess risk …
Recently there has been a surge of interest in understanding implicit regularization properties of iterative gradient-based optimization algorithms. In this paper, we study the statistical guarantees on the excess risk achieved by early-stopped unconstrained mirror descent algorithms applied to the unregularized empirical risk with the squared loss for linear models and kernel methods. By completing an inequality that characterizes convexity for the squared loss, we identify an intrinsic link between offset Rademacher complexities and potential-based convergence analysis of mirror descent methods. Our observation immediately yields excess risk guarantees for the path traced by the iterates of mirror descent in terms of offset complexities of certain function classes depending only on the choice of the mirror map, initialization point, step-size, and the number of iterations. We apply our theory to recover, in a clean and elegant manner via rather short proofs, some of the recent results in the implicit regularization literature, while also showing how to improve upon them in some settings.
We investigate implicit regularization schemes for gradient descent methods applied to unpenalized least squares regression to solve the problem of reconstructing a sparse signal from an underdetermined system of linear …
We investigate implicit regularization schemes for gradient descent methods applied to unpenalized least squares regression to solve the problem of reconstructing a sparse signal from an underdetermined system of linear measurements under the restricted isometry assumption. For a given parametrization yielding a non-convex optimization problem, we show that prescribed choices of initialization, step size and stopping time yield a statistically and computationally optimal algorithm that achieves the minimax rate with the same cost required to read the data up to poly-logarithmic factors. Beyond minimax optimality, we show that our algorithm adapts to instance difficulty and yields a dimension-independent rate when the signal-to-noise ratio is high enough. Key to the computational efficiency of our method is an increasing step size scheme that adapts to refined estimates of the true solution. We validate our findings with numerical experiments and compare our algorithm against explicit $\ell_{1}$ penalization. Going from hard instances to easy ones, our algorithm is seen to undergo a phase transition, eventually matching least squares with an oracle knowledge of the true support.
We investigate implicit regularization schemes for gradient descent methods applied to unpenalized least squares regression to solve the problem of reconstructing a sparse signal from an underdetermined system of linear …
We investigate implicit regularization schemes for gradient descent methods applied to unpenalized least squares regression to solve the problem of reconstructing a sparse signal from an underdetermined system of linear measurements under the restricted isometry assumption. For a given parametrization yielding a non-convex optimization problem, we show that prescribed choices of initialization, step size and stopping time yield a statistically and computationally optimal algorithm that achieves the minimax rate with the same cost required to read the data up to poly-logarithmic factors. Beyond minimax optimality, we show that our algorithm adapts to instance difficulty and yields a dimension-independent rate when the signal-to-noise ratio is high enough. Key to the computational efficiency of our method is an increasing step size scheme that adapts to refined estimates of the true solution. We validate our findings with numerical experiments and compare our algorithm against explicit $\ell_{1}$ penalization. Going from hard instances to easy ones, our algorithm is seen to undergo a phase transition, eventually matching least squares with an oracle knowledge of the true support.
We investigate implicit regularization schemes for gradient descent methods applied to unpenalized least squares regression to solve the problem of reconstructing a sparse signal from an underdetermined system of linear …
We investigate implicit regularization schemes for gradient descent methods applied to unpenalized least squares regression to solve the problem of reconstructing a sparse signal from an underdetermined system of linear measurements under the restricted isometry assumption. For a given parametrization yielding a non-convex optimization problem, we show that prescribed choices of initialization, step size and stopping time yield a statistically and computationally optimal algorithm that achieves the minimax rate with the same cost required to read the data up to poly-logarithmic factors. Beyond minimax optimality, we show that our algorithm adapts to instance difficulty and yields a dimension-independent rate when the signal-to-noise ratio is high enough. Key to the computational efficiency of our method is an increasing step size scheme that adapts to refined estimates of the true solution. We validate our findings with numerical experiments and compare our algorithm against explicit $\ell_{1}$ penalization. Going from hard instances to easy ones, our algorithm is seen to undergo a phase transition, eventually matching least squares with an oracle knowledge of the true support.