 
 
 
 
 
 
Re: Numerically computing partial derivatives
- To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
- Subject: [mg47989] Re: Numerically computing partial derivatives
- From: Paul Abbott <paul at physics.uwa.edu.au>
- Date: Tue, 4 May 2004 07:03:23 -0400 (EDT)
- Organization: The University of Western Australia
- References: <c72d7k$jk$1@smc.vnet.net>
- Sender: owner-wri-mathgroup at wolfram.com
In article <c72d7k$jk$1 at smc.vnet.net>,
 Mark Coleman <mark at markscoleman.com> wrote:
> I am working with a maximum likelihood problem in econometrics. With 
> some effort I can get Mathematica v5.0 to maximize the function. In order to 
> derive standard errors of the estimates, however, I need to calculate 
> the Hessian of the function at the optimal solution. This requires, of 
> course,  calculating the set of second derivatives of the function. Due 
> to the nature of the function, however, neither the built-in D or ND 
> operator seem to work (note: The function contains a term of the form 
> Log[Det[I-rho*W]], where I is the nxn Identity matrix, rho is a real, 
> and W is a non-symmetric (sparse) matrix of reals, or order n. In 
> practice, n > 1000 at times. As a result, symbolic differentiation is 
> not feasible. In addition, when I use ND [], I get nonsensical answers.
I assume you realize that
   Log[Det[I-rho W]] == Sum[Log[1-rho lambda[i]],{i,n}]
where lambda[i] is the i-th eigenvalue of W. Can't you use this to 
achieve symbolic differentiation?
Cheers,
Paul
-- 
Paul Abbott                                   Phone: +61 8 9380 2734
School of Physics, M013                         Fax: +61 8 9380 1014
The University of Western Australia      (CRICOS Provider No 00126G)         
35 Stirling Highway
Crawley WA 6009                      mailto:paul at physics.uwa.edu.au 
AUSTRALIA                            http://physics.uwa.edu.au/~paul

