Combining Uncertain Estimates

Henru Hamburger George Mason University and Naval Research Laboratory In an expert system, it is necessary to supply the values of various parameters. Ideally, an absolutely reliable source is available to supply an exact value for any parameter. In reality, one may have unreliable, unconfident, conflicting estimates of the value for a particular parameter. This paper is a consideration of how to represent and combine imperfect estimates. It is assumed that the knowledge from each source takes the form of an estimate of the parameter value, paired with an associated measure of uncertainty.