Dempster's Rule for Evidence Ordered in a Complete Directed Acyclic Graph

TL;DR

This paper introduces a more efficient algorithm for applying Dempster's rule to evidence organized in a complete directed acyclic graph, enabling faster inference of the most probable path in hierarchical evidence networks.

Contribution

It presents a novel algorithm with lower computational complexity for Dempster's rule in ordered evidence graphs, improving efficiency over traditional methods.

Findings

New algorithm has complexity O(|THETA| log |THETA|)

Reduces computational effort compared to brute force methods

Applicable to hierarchical evidence networks with ordered evidence

Abstract

For the case of evidence ordered in a complete directed acyclic graph this paper presents a new algorithm with lower computational complexity for Dempster's rule than that of step-by-step application of Dempster's rule. In this problem, every original pair of evidences, has a corresponding evidence against the simultaneous belief in both propositions. In this case, it is uncertain whether the propositions of any two evidences are in logical conflict. The original evidences are associated with the vertices and the additional evidences are associated with the edges. The original evidences are ordered, i.e., for every pair of evidences it is determinable which of the two evidences is the earlier one. We are interested in finding the most probable completely specified path through the graph, where transitions are possible only from lower- to higher-ranked vertices. The path is here a representation for a sequence of states, for instance a sequence of snapshots of a physical object's track. A completely specified path means that the path includes no other vertices than those stated in the path representation, as opposed to an incompletely specified path that may also include other vertices than those stated. In a hierarchical network of all subsets of the frame, i.e., of all incompletely specified paths, the original and additional evidences support subsets that are not disjoint, thus it is not possible to prune the network to a tree. Instead of propagating belief, the new algorithm reasons about the logical conditions of a completely specified path through the graph. The new algorithm is O(|THETA| log |THETA|), compared to O(|THETA| ** log |THETA|) of the classic brute force algorithm.