How to Estimate Unknown Unknowns: From Cosmic Light to Election Polls

Authors

Talha Azfar, The University of Texas at El PasoFollow
Vignesh Ponraj, The University of Texas at El PasoFollow
Vladik Kreinovich, The University of Texas at El PasoFollow
Nguyen Hoang Phuong, Thang Long UniversityFollow

Publication Date

7-1-2023

Comments

Technical Report: UTEP-CS-23-39

Abstract

In two different areas of research -- in the study of space light and in the study of voting -- the observed value of the quantity of interest is twice larger than what we would expect. That the observed value is larger makes perfect sense: there are phenomena that we do not take into account in our estimations. However, the fact that the observed value is exactly twice larger deserves explanation. In this paper, we show that Laplace Indeterminacy Principle leads to such an explanation.