Welcome to the Spring 2013 homepage for CMPSCI 240: Reasoning About Uncertainty.
- Instructor:
- Andrew McGregor. Email: mcgregor at cs.
- Office hours: Wednesday 1:30-2:30 in CMPS 334 or by appointment.
- TA:
- Emma Tosch and Nick Hobbs. Email: etosch at cs and hobbs at cs.
- Office hours: Thursday 4:00-5:00 in LGRT 223/225 or by appointment.
- Textbook:
The textbooks will be
- Required: Introduction to Probability, 2nd Edition by Dimitri P. Bertsekas and John N. Tsitsiklis.
- Useful: Introduction to Probability by Charles M. Grinstead and J. Laurie Snell. See here for solution of the odd numbered exercises.
- Grade Brakedown:
- Participation (10%): Discussion section activities and in-class quizzes.
- Homework (20%): Weekly multiple-choice quiz (in Moodle) and six sets of written homework problems.
- Midterm 1 (15%): Focuses on lectures 1-7.
- Midterm 2 (15%): Focuses on lectures 8-14.
- Midterm 3 (15%): Focuses on lectures 15-20.
- Final (25%): Covers all lectures.
- Homeworks and Exams:
- Emma's Mathematics Cheat Sheet
- Homework 1: Due 2/12
- Homework 2: Due 3/12
- Homework 3: Due 4/9
- Homework 4: Due 4/30
- Programming: Due 4/17
- First Midterm and Solutions
- Second Midterm and Solutions
- Third Midterm and Solutions
- Final and Solutions
Honesty and Collaboration Policy: Violating any of the following rules risks an automatic F. Ask if you're unsure about any of the policies.- Homework: Collaborating with at most two other students in the homework is allowed but answers must be written independently and you should mention who you worked with.
- Quizzes: No collaboration! But you can consult any material you like.
- Exams: Closed book and no collaboration.
- Schedule and Slides: Here's an approximate schedule for the course. Note that this'll be updated as we go along depending on our progress and, hopefully, we'll get to squeeze in a couple of extra topcs. I'll add slides after each class (some links will be dead until the slides are added).
Date Topic Reading and Background Lec 1 22 Jan Preliminaries, Sets, Probability 1-9 [BT] Lec 2 24 Jan Basic properties of probability 10-22 [BT] Lec 3 29 Jan Conditional probability 22-28 [BT] Disc 1 30 Jan Discussion Simpson's Paradox Lec 4 31 Jan Sequential experiments 28-34 [BT] Lec 5 5 Feb The total probability theorem and Bayes rule 34-41 [BT] Disc 2 6 Feb Discussion Monty Hall Problem Lec 6 7 Feb Independent trials and the binomial law 42-51 [BT] Lec 7 12 Feb Permutations, combinations, and paritions 42-51 [BT] Disc 3 13 Feb Discussion: Exam Review First Revision Handout Exam 1 7pm, 13 Feb First Midterm (focus on lectures 1-7). Exam in Goessmann 51 and 64. pp. 1-51 [BT] Lec 8 14 Feb Random variables and binomial distribution pp.72-81 [BT] - 19 Feb [Monday Schedule] Disc 4 20 Feb Discussion: Lec 9 21 Feb Geometric and Poisson Randon Variables pp. 72-81 [BT] Lec 10 26 Feb Functions of Random Variables pp. 81-92 [BT] Disc 5 27 Feb Discussion: Lec 11 28 Feb Variance and Tail Bounds pp. 264-270 [BT] Lec 12 5 Mar Chebyshev Bound pp. 264-270 [BT], Chebyshev Video Disc 6 6 Mar Discussion: Lec 13 7 Mar Multiple Random Variables pp. 92-115 [BT] Lec 14 12 Mar Covariance, Correlation and Causation pp. 217-221 [BT] Disc 7 13 Mar Discussion: Exam Review Second Revision Handout Exam 2 7pm, 13 Mar Second Midterm (focus on lectures 8-14). Exam in Goessmann 51 and 64. pp. 71-118, 217-221, 264-270 [BT] Lec 15 14 Mar Coupon Collecting Coupon Collecting Lec 16 26 Mar Balls and Bins Disc 8 27 Mar Discussion: - 28 Mar [No class] Lec 17 2 Apr Spam Filtering and Naive Bayes Classification Disc 9 3 Apr Discussion: NBC Programming Assignment Programming Lec 18 4 Apr Bayesian Networks Lec 19 9 Apr Bayesian Networks Disc 10 3 Apr Discussion: Exam Review Third Revision Handout Exam 3 7pm, 10 Apr Third Midterm (focus on lectures 15-19). Exam in Goessmann 51 and 64. Lec 20 11 Apr Markov Chains pp. 340-362 [BT] Lec 21 16 Apr Markov Chains pp. 340-362 [BT] - 17 Apr [Monday Schedule] Lec 22 18 Apr Game Theory Lec 23 23 Apr More Game Theory Disc 11 24 Apr Discussion: Lec 24 25 Apr Information Theory Lec 25 30 Apr Information Theory Disc 12 1 May Discussion: Exam Review Fourth Revision Handout Exam 4 4pm, 7 May Final Exam (covers entire course). Exam in Engineering Lab II Room 119