Mathematics of Uncertainty: Ideas, Methods, Application Problems (Studies in Fuzziness and Soft Computing)

"Mathematics of Uncertainty" provides the basic ideas and foundations of uncertainty, covering the fields of mathematics in which uncertainty, variability, imprecision and fuzziness of data are of importance. This introductory book describes the basic ideas of the mathematical fields of uncertainty from simple interpolation to wavelets, from error propagation to fuzzy sets and neural networks. The book presents the treatment of problems of interpolation and approximation, as well as observation fuzziness which can essentially influence the preciseness and reliability of statements on functional relationships. The notions of randomness and probability are examined as a model for the variability of observation and measurement results. Besides these basic ideas the book also presents methods of qualitative data analysis such as cluster analysis and classification, and of evaluation of functional relationships such as regression analysis and quantitative fuzzy data analysis.