时间：20 January 2026 15:30 to 16:30
地点：Bush House South East Wing, Strand Campus, London
The Department of Mathematics is hosting a series of colloquia, open for all to attend. On 20 January 2026, Vladimir Vovk from Royal Holloway, University of London will give a talk on ‘A duality in the foundations of probability and statistics through history.'
Registration:
This talk will take place in person at King's College London in Bush Hose SE (1.05). A reception will follow afterwards. The talk will also be streamed online via Microsoft Teams. Please click 'Get tickets' to sign up for either an In-Person Ticket or an Online Ticket. If you wish to attend the in-person event, you must select the correct ticket type.
Abstract
A duality in the foundations of probability and statistics through history
There are two complementary ways to view probability; namely, we can define and apply it in terms of counting or in terms of betting. Both ways are useful in applications of probability including statistics. I will give a historical account of these two ways, argue that they are in some sense dual to each other, and conclude with a brief review of recent work on game-theoretic statistics.
About the Speaker:
Vladimir Vovk is a professor in the Department of Computer Science at Royal Holloway, University of London, and co-director of the Centre for Reliable Machine Learning there. He obtained his PhD in June 1988 from Moscow State University. Vovk is widely recognized for founding the framework of game-theoretic probability and for co-inventing conformal prediction. His work has a marked impact across probability theory and AI.
Learn more about Vladimir Vovk on his webpage and also on Wikipedia.
