by Sara van de Geer. Also, we did not include material due to David Donoho, lain Johnstone, and their school. We found our­ selves unprepared to write a distillate of the material. We did touch briefly on "nonparametrics," but not on "semiparamet­ rics." This is because we feel that the semiparametric situation has not yet been properly structured. We hope that the reader will find this book interesting and challenging, in spite of its shortcomings. The material was typed in LaTeX form by the authors them­ selves, borrowing liberally from the 1990 script by Chris Bush. It was reviewed anonymously by distinguished colleagues. We thank them for their kind encouragement. Very special thanks are due to Professor David Pollard who took time out of a busy schedule to give us a long list of suggestions. We did not follow them all, but we at least made attempts. We wish also to thank the staff of Springer-Verlag for their help, in particular editor John Kimmel, who tried to make us work with all deliberate speed. Thanks are due to Paul Smith, Te-Ching Chen and Ju-Yi-Yen, who helped with the last-minute editorial corrections.

This book grew out of lectures delivered at the University of California, Berkeley, over many years. The subject is a part of asymptotics in statistics, organized around a few central ideas. The presentation proceeds from the general to the particular since this seemed the best way to emphasize the basic concepts. The reader is expected to have been exposed to statistical thinking and methodology, as expounded for instance in the book by H. Cramer [1946] or the more recent text by P. Bickel and K. Doksum [1977]. Another pos­ sibility, closer to the present in spirit, is Ferguson [1967]. Otherwise the reader is expected to possess some mathematical maturity, but not really a great deal of detailed mathematical knowledge. Very few mathematical objects are used; their assumed properties are simple; the results are almost always immediate consequences of the definitions. Some objects, such as vector lattices, may not have been included in the standard background of a student of statistics. For these we have provided a summary of relevant facts in the Appendix. The basic structures in the whole affair are systems that Blackwell called "experiments" and "transitions" between them. An "experiment" is a mathe­ matical abstraction intended to describe the basic features of an observational process if that process is contemplated in advance of its implementation. Typically, an experiment consists of a set E> of theories about what may happen in the observational process.

by Sara van de Geer. Also, we did not include material due to David Donoho, lain Johnstone, and their school. We found our­ selves unprepared to write a distillate of the material. We did touch briefly on "nonparametrics," but not on "semiparamet­ rics." This is because we feel that the semiparametric situation has not yet been properly structured. We hope that the reader will find this book interesting and challenging, in spite of its shortcomings. The material was typed in LaTeX form by the authors them­ selves, borrowing liberally from the 1990 script by Chris Bush. It was reviewed anonymously by distinguished colleagues. We thank them for their kind encouragement. Very special thanks are due to Professor David Pollard who took time out of a busy schedule to give us a long list of suggestions. We did not follow them all, but we at least made attempts. We wish also to thank the staff of Springer-Verlag for their help, in particular editor John Kimmel, who tried to make us work with all deliberate speed. Thanks are due to Paul Smith, Te-Ching Chen and Ju-Yi-Yen, who helped with the last-minute editorial corrections.

This book grew out of lectures delivered at the University of California, Berkeley, over many years. The subject is a part of asymptotics in statistics, organized around a few central ideas. The presentation proceeds from the general to the particular since this seemed the best way to emphasize the basic concepts. The reader is expected to have been exposed to statistical thinking and methodology, as expounded for instance in the book by H. Cramer [1946] or the more recent text by P. Bickel and K. Doksum [1977]. Another pos­ sibility, closer to the present in spirit, is Ferguson [1967]. Otherwise the reader is expected to possess some mathematical maturity, but not really a great deal of detailed mathematical knowledge. Very few mathematical objects are used; their assumed properties are simple; the results are almost always immediate consequences of the definitions. Some objects, such as vector lattices, may not have been included in the standard background of a student of statistics. For these we have provided a summary of relevant facts in the Appendix. The basic structures in the whole affair are systems that Blackwell called "experiments" and "transitions" between them. An "experiment" is a mathe­ matical abstraction intended to describe the basic features of an observational process if that process is contemplated in advance of its implementation. Typically, an experiment consists of a set E> of theories about what may happen in the observational process.

by Sara van de Geer. Also, we did not include material due to David Donoho, lain Johnstone, and their school. We found our­ selves unprepared to write a distillate of the material. We did touch briefly on "nonparametrics," but not on "semiparamet­ rics." This is because we feel that the semiparametric situation has not yet been properly structured. We hope that the reader will find this book interesting and challenging, in spite of its shortcomings. The material was typed in LaTeX form by the authors them­ selves, borrowing liberally from the 1990 script by Chris Bush. It was reviewed anonymously by distinguished colleagues. We thank them for their kind encouragement. Very special thanks are due to Professor David Pollard who took time out of a busy schedule to give us a long list of suggestions. We did not follow them all, but we at least made attempts. We wish also to thank the staff of Springer-Verlag for their help, in particular editor John Kimmel, who tried to make us work with all deliberate speed. Thanks are due to Paul Smith, Te-Ching Chen and Ju-Yi-Yen, who helped with the last-minute editorial corrections.

This book grew out of lectures delivered at the University of California, Berkeley, over many years. The subject is a part of asymptotics in statistics, organized around a few central ideas. The presentation proceeds from the general to the particular since this seemed the best way to emphasize the basic concepts. The reader is expected to have been exposed to statistical thinking and methodology, as expounded for instance in the book by H. Cramer [1946] or the more recent text by P. Bickel and K. Doksum [1977]. Another pos­ sibility, closer to the present in spirit, is Ferguson [1967]. Otherwise the reader is expected to possess some mathematical maturity, but not really a great deal of detailed mathematical knowledge. Very few mathematical objects are used; their assumed properties are simple; the results are almost always immediate consequences of the definitions. Some objects, such as vector lattices, may not have been included in the standard background of a student of statistics. For these we have provided a summary of relevant facts in the Appendix. The basic structures in the whole affair are systems that Blackwell called "experiments" and "transitions" between them. An "experiment" is a mathe­ matical abstraction intended to describe the basic features of an observational process if that process is contemplated in advance of its implementation. Typically, an experiment consists of a set E> of theories about what may happen in the observational process.

by Sara van de Geer. Also, we did not include material due to David Donoho, lain Johnstone, and their school. We found our­ selves unprepared to write a distillate of the material. We did touch briefly on "nonparametrics," but not on "semiparamet­ rics." This is because we feel that the semiparametric situation has not yet been properly structured. We hope that the reader will find this book interesting and challenging, in spite of its shortcomings. The material was typed in LaTeX form by the authors them­ selves, borrowing liberally from the 1990 script by Chris Bush. It was reviewed anonymously by distinguished colleagues. We thank them for their kind encouragement. Very special thanks are due to Professor David Pollard who took time out of a busy schedule to give us a long list of suggestions. We did not follow them all, but we at least made attempts. We wish also to thank the staff of Springer-Verlag for their help, in particular editor John Kimmel, who tried to make us work with all deliberate speed. Thanks are due to Paul Smith, Te-Ching Chen and Ju-Yi-Yen, who helped with the last-minute editorial corrections.

This book grew out of lectures delivered at the University of California, Berkeley, over many years. The subject is a part of asymptotics in statistics, organized around a few central ideas. The presentation proceeds from the general to the particular since this seemed the best way to emphasize the basic concepts. The reader is expected to have been exposed to statistical thinking and methodology, as expounded for instance in the book by H. Cramer [1946] or the more recent text by P. Bickel and K. Doksum [1977]. Another pos­ sibility, closer to the present in spirit, is Ferguson [1967]. Otherwise the reader is expected to possess some mathematical maturity, but not really a great deal of detailed mathematical knowledge. Very few mathematical objects are used; their assumed properties are simple; the results are almost always immediate consequences of the definitions. Some objects, such as vector lattices, may not have been included in the standard background of a student of statistics. For these we have provided a summary of relevant facts in the Appendix. The basic structures in the whole affair are systems that Blackwell called "experiments" and "transitions" between them. An "experiment" is a mathe­ matical abstraction intended to describe the basic features of an observational process if that process is contemplated in advance of its implementation. Typically, an experiment consists of a set E> of theories about what may happen in the observational process.

by Sara van de Geer. Also, we did not include material due to David Donoho, lain Johnstone, and their school. We found our­ selves unprepared to write a distillate of the material. We did touch briefly on "nonparametrics," but not on "semiparamet­ rics." This is because we feel that the semiparametric situation has not yet been properly structured. We hope that the reader will find this book interesting and challenging, in spite of its shortcomings. The material was typed in LaTeX form by the authors them­ selves, borrowing liberally from the 1990 script by Chris Bush. It was reviewed anonymously by distinguished colleagues. We thank them for their kind encouragement. Very special thanks are due to Professor David Pollard who took time out of a busy schedule to give us a long list of suggestions. We did not follow them all, but we at least made attempts. We wish also to thank the staff of Springer-Verlag for their help, in particular editor John Kimmel, who tried to make us work with all deliberate speed. Thanks are due to Paul Smith, Te-Ching Chen and Ju-Yi-Yen, who helped with the last-minute editorial corrections.

This book grew out of lectures delivered at the University of California, Berkeley, over many years. The subject is a part of asymptotics in statistics, organized around a few central ideas. The presentation proceeds from the general to the particular since this seemed the best way to emphasize the basic concepts. The reader is expected to have been exposed to statistical thinking and methodology, as expounded for instance in the book by H. Cramer [1946] or the more recent text by P. Bickel and K. Doksum [1977]. Another pos­ sibility, closer to the present in spirit, is Ferguson [1967]. Otherwise the reader is expected to possess some mathematical maturity, but not really a great deal of detailed mathematical knowledge. Very few mathematical objects are used; their assumed properties are simple; the results are almost always immediate consequences of the definitions. Some objects, such as vector lattices, may not have been included in the standard background of a student of statistics. For these we have provided a summary of relevant facts in the Appendix. The basic structures in the whole affair are systems that Blackwell called "experiments" and "transitions" between them. An "experiment" is a mathe­ matical abstraction intended to describe the basic features of an observational process if that process is contemplated in advance of its implementation. Typically, an experiment consists of a set E> of theories about what may happen in the observational process.

by Sara van de Geer. Also, we did not include material due to David Donoho, lain Johnstone, and their school. We found our­ selves unprepared to write a distillate of the material. We did touch briefly on "nonparametrics," but not on "semiparamet­ rics." This is because we feel that the semiparametric situation has not yet been properly structured. We hope that the reader will find this book interesting and challenging, in spite of its shortcomings. The material was typed in LaTeX form by the authors them­ selves, borrowing liberally from the 1990 script by Chris Bush. It was reviewed anonymously by distinguished colleagues. We thank them for their kind encouragement. Very special thanks are due to Professor David Pollard who took time out of a busy schedule to give us a long list of suggestions. We did not follow them all, but we at least made attempts. We wish also to thank the staff of Springer-Verlag for their help, in particular editor John Kimmel, who tried to make us work with all deliberate speed. Thanks are due to Paul Smith, Te-Ching Chen and Ju-Yi-Yen, who helped with the last-minute editorial corrections.

This book grew out of lectures delivered at the University of California, Berkeley, over many years. The subject is a part of asymptotics in statistics, organized around a few central ideas. The presentation proceeds from the general to the particular since this seemed the best way to emphasize the basic concepts. The reader is expected to have been exposed to statistical thinking and methodology, as expounded for instance in the book by H. Cramer [1946] or the more recent text by P. Bickel and K. Doksum [1977]. Another pos­ sibility, closer to the present in spirit, is Ferguson [1967]. Otherwise the reader is expected to possess some mathematical maturity, but not really a great deal of detailed mathematical knowledge. Very few mathematical objects are used; their assumed properties are simple; the results are almost always immediate consequences of the definitions. Some objects, such as vector lattices, may not have been included in the standard background of a student of statistics. For these we have provided a summary of relevant facts in the Appendix. The basic structures in the whole affair are systems that Blackwell called "experiments" and "transitions" between them. An "experiment" is a mathe­ matical abstraction intended to describe the basic features of an observational process if that process is contemplated in advance of its implementation. Typically, an experiment consists of a set E> of theories about what may happen in the observational process.