Archive for posters

O’Bayes 2013

Posted in Statistics, Travel, University life, Wines with tags , , , , , , , on December 17, 2013 by xi'an

IMG_2188It was quite sad that we had to start the O-Bayes 2103 conference with the news that Dennis Lindley passed away, but the meeting is the best opportunity to share memories and stress his impact on the field. This is what happened yesterday in and around the talks. The conference(s) is/are very well-attended, with 200-some participants in total, and many young researchers. As in the earlier meetings, the talks are a mixture of “classical” objective Bayes and non-parametric Bayes (my own feeling being of a very fuzzy boundary between both perspectives, both relying to some extent on asymptotics for validation). I enjoyed in particular Jayanta’s Ghosh talk on the construction of divergence measures for reference priors that would necessarily lead to the Jeffreys prior. With the side open problem of determining whether there are only three functional distances (Hellinger, Kullback and L1 that are independent of the dominating measure. (Upon reflection, I am not sure about this question and whether I got it correctly, as one can always use the prior π as the dominating measure and look at divergences of the form

J(\pi) = \int d\left(\dfrac{\text{d}\pi(\cdot|x)}{\text{d}\pi(\cdot)}\right) m(x)\text{d}x

which seems to open up the range of possible d’s…) However, and in the great tradition of Bayesian meetings, the best part of the day was the poster session. From enjoying a (local) beer with old friends to discussing points and details.  (It is just unfortunate that by 8:15 I was simply sleeping on my feet and could not complete my round of O’Bayes posters, not even mentioning EFaB posters that sounded equally attractive… I even missed discussing around a capture-recapture poster!)

MCMSki IV, Jan. 6-9, 2014, Chamonix (news #13)

Posted in Mountains, Statistics, Travel, University life with tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on December 9, 2013 by xi'an

Now, most poster abstracts have been received (or at least 63 of them),  even though newcomers can still send them to my wordpress address (if they realise the message gets posted immediately!, so the format Subject: firstname secondname (affiliation): title and text: abstract must be respected! No personal message or query please!). We have now above 200 registered participants, with all sessions remaining miraculously full (after a few permutations in the program).

S0 it is time to mention a wee bit of the “ski” side of MCMski. Chamonix has two types of ski passes, Chamonix Le Pass, and Mont Blanc Unlimited, the later allowing a wide access to the Mont Blanc area, up to 3800 meters and in France, Italy, and Switzerland, but presumably harder to exploit to the fullest on a 4 hour afternoon break. (You have to arrange renting skis and buying passes on your own! The conference centre may answer moderate queries but not make any booking.)  The temperature in the town of Chamonix is currently between -7 and 0 (centigrades), with ten centimetres of snow in town. All ski areas will be open by Dec. 21. If you plan to ski the Vallée Blanche from Aiguille du Midi, at 3800m, I strongly advise renting a guide for this ultimate skiing experience!

Big big big news: not only the ski race will take place on Wed., Jan. 08, afternoon, organised by ESF Chamonix, but Antonietta Mira managed to secure one or two pairs of skis for the winner(s) of the race! I doubt there will be other opportunities of that magnitude for winning a magnificent pair of skis made in Italy by Blossom skis. Thanks a lot to Anto!!! And to Blossom skis (whose collection includes a series called FreeTibet.)

MCMSki IV, Jan. 6-8, 2014, Chamonix (news #12)

Posted in Mountains, R, Statistics, University life with tags , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 26, 2013 by xi'an

We are converging towards MCMSki IV getting closer and closer to the conference! I hope that by now all intended participants have registered (registration is still open!), found a place where to stay during and around the conference (still feasible!), and booked their flight to Geneva (or nearby).

First, please send me asap the  poster abstract to bayesianstatistics@gmail.com if you plan to present a poster. We are currently with 45 abstracts on my special wordpress blog and there is no deadline for sending your abstracts. Even though Jan. 07 may be a wee bit extreme….

Second, we are currently 195 registered participants. This is fantastic! I am looking forward this great company and do not expect to find free time to go skiing during the meeting! Note that there will be hardly any conference material, except for a single sheet with the program and rooms, so make sure to plan your session in advance. I also remind participants that the banquet is a paying option in the registration form. The cost is not included in the basic registration…

Third, make sure of your travel plans to and back from Chamonix. The airport in Geneva is 80 km away and you need to book a shuttle or a bus if your timing does not coincide with the two three shuttles (each way) available via the conference registration page. There are two doodles to monitor arrivals and departures, but hardly any entry so far. Not sure I can add any extra shuttle, but if there are enough of you… Check on the conference website for travel tips. And do not, I repeat do not!, consider booking a taxi at Geneva airport as an option, since they are extremely expensive. Horrendously so. (Both on the French and Swiss sides of the airport.)

MCMSki IV, Jan. 6-8, 2014, Chamonix (news #11)

Posted in Mountains, R, Statistics, University life with tags , , , , , , , , , , , , on October 25, 2013 by xi'an

Now that the important deadline of October 15 for MCMSki IV is over,

First, thanks to the more that 160 participants who already registred! The audience is now larger than at any of the previous MCMSki meetings! (Obviously, from a statistical perspective, the comparison is somewhat unfair as running three parallel sessions instead of one single track session is bound to attract more participants, like the speakers themselves!) But it means a lot of people interacting with one another, sharing ideas and tricks at the coffee breaks. Fighting for restaurants and ski lifts. Exchanging stories and gossips at the poster session(s). Competing during the Richard Tweedie ski race. Sounds very exciting! And those who have not yet registered still have till mid December to do so (the only potential worry being a shortage of rooms available in town).

Second, 28 students and junior investigators have been awarded the young investigator travel support for some moderate amount of money toward travelling to Geneva and Chamonix. Thanks to ISBA and to SBSS (the Bayesian Statistical Science Section of the ASA) and to the BayesComp Section of ISBA for their financial support.

Third, let me repeat that poster presentations are not subject to a selection process and that anyone attending MCMSki IV should feel like presenting a poster at one of the two poster nights. There is still plenty of space and of opportunities for interactions and sound advices. Just send an abstract to bayesianstatistics@gmail.com ! See my special wordpress blog for the first deposits of abstracts.

MCMSki IV, Jan. 6-8, 2014, Chamonix (news #10)

Posted in Mountains, R, Statistics, University life with tags , , , , , , , , , , , , , on October 14, 2013 by xi'an

This a final reminder about the October 15 deadlines for MCMSki IV:

First, the early bird rate for the registration ends up on October 15.

Second, the young investigator travel support can only be requested up to October 15 as well. (For those waiting for the decision about the support to register, the registration deadline will be lifted!)

Third, poster presentations are not subject to a selection process: anyone attending MCMSki IV is free to present a poster at one of the two poster nights. Just send an abstract to bayesianstatistics@gmail.com !