arXiv AI

Using Large Language Models as Low-Cost Statistical Estimators for Human-Response Data

arXiv:2606. 30372v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Quantitative research across the social and behavioral sciences depends on human subject experiments that are expensive, slow, and subject to sampling bias.

arXiv Machine Learning
Jun 9

Partial Identification under Missing Data Using Weak Shadow Variables from Pretrained Models

arXiv:2602. 16061v2 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Estimating population quantities such as mean outcomes from user feedback is fundamental to platform evaluation and social science, yet feedback is often missing not at random (MNAR): users with stronger opinions are more likely to respond, so standard estimators are biased and the estimand is not identified without additional assumptions.

By Hongyu Chen, David Simchi-Levi, Ruoxuan Xiong
arXiv AI
Aug 20

Debiased Inference for AI-Generated Data without Gold-Standard Labels: Identification via Multiple Imperfect Measurements

The paper introduces Debiased Inference with Multiple Imperfect Measurements (DMM), a framework that uses several error‑prone AI measurements to perform valid downstream statistical inference without requiring costly gold‑standard labels. By assuming conditional independence of the measurements given the true label and unit‑level features, DMM leverages CP decomposition and semiparametric theory to prove consistency and asymptotic normality of its estimator. Simulations demonstrate that DMM yields valid inference and can improve efficiency when additional imperfect measurements are available, and the authors provide diagnostics for the key independence assumption.

By Naoki Egami, Sooahn Shin
arXiv AI
Sep 21

Large Language Models As Shannon Lossy Compressors Not Solomonoff Induction Estimators: The Singularity Is Not Near Without Symbolic Model Synthesis

The paper argues that Large Language Models (LLMs) do not function as Solomonoff induction estimators because their training objectives—cross‑entropy, negative log‑likelihood, and next‑token prediction—optimize fit to a supplied conditional distribution rather than a program‑weighted universal mixture. It further contends that additional computation alone does not transform these models into optimal predictors without external hyper‑parameter or architectural changes. The authors suggest that neurosymbolic machine learning, exemplified by models such as Fable and Astra, represents a shift toward symbolic model synthesis, moving beyond purely statistical LLMs.

By Hector Zenil, Abicumaran Uthamacumaran, Luan Ozelim
arXiv Machine Learning
Jun 26

Learning from a Biased Sample

arXiv:2209. 01754v5 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: The empirical risk minimization approach to data-driven decision making requires access to training data drawn under the same conditions as those that will be faced when the decision rule is deployed.

By Roshni Sahoo, Lihua Lei, Stefan Wager
arXiv Machine Learning
Aug 4

Tail-Aware Information-Theoretic Bounds for LLM Alignment under Heavy-Tailed Rewards

arXiv:2604. 10727v2 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Classical information-theoretic learning bounds typically rely on KL mutual information and moment-generating-function (MGF) arguments, which are well matched to bounded or sub-Gaussian losses but can be ineffective when losses or rewards are heavy-tailed.

By Huiming Zhang, Binghan Li, Wan Tian, Qiang Sun
arXiv Machine Learning
Sep 1

Prediction-Powered Conditional Inference

arXiv:2603.05575v2 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: We study prediction-powered conditional inference in the setting where labeled data are scarce, unlabeled covariates are abundant, and a blac...

By Yang Sui, Jin Zhou, Hua Zhou, Xiaowu Dai
arXiv AI
4d ago

OTROPE: Optimal Transport-based Robust Off-policy Evaluation for Large Language Models

The paper introduces OTROPE, a likelihood‑free method for off‑policy evaluation of large language models (LLMs) that uses optimal transport to align labeled samples from a behavior model with unlabeled samples from a target model in a semantic space. OTROPE corrects human‑labeled residuals with proxy predictors, achieving a doubly robust evaluation without requiring behavior‑policy modeling or density‑ratio estimation. The authors provide theoretical guarantees for consistency and convergence, and demonstrate through synthetic and real LLM tasks that OTROPE outperforms existing baselines and can elevate weaker evaluators to match or exceed stronger ones.

By Liner Xiang, Wenbo Zhang, Hengrui Cai