Sending a value assuming a mixture of two
equal Gaussians
The blue curve is the
normalized sum of the
two Gaussians.
x
• The point halfway between the two Gaussians should
cost –log(p(x)) bits where p(x) is its density under one of
the Gaussians.
– But in the MDL story the cost should be –log(p(x))
plus one bit to say which Gaussian we are using.
– How can we make the MDL story give the right
answer?