CosmoMC GetDist plots

Use of Cobaya. camb, CLASS, cosmomc, compilers, etc.
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Antony Lewis
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Joined: September 23 2004
Affiliation: University of Sussex
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CosmoMC GetDist plots

Post by Antony Lewis » May 24 2006

Since many people get this wrong, here is an illustration of what happens when generating plots from a tensor run (with prior r>0), with and without setting GetDist limits parameters correctly:

Incorrect result when limits12 is not set:
Image

Correct result when setting limits12=0 N:
Image

Note that settings limits12=0 1 would give an incorrect result: GetDist would think you had a prior 0<r<1, and hence up-weight the last bin at r=1, hence giving an overestimate of the marginalized probability there.

You need to set limits parameters in the GetDist .ini file for any parameters you use or add that have posterior constraints that do not go to zero at one (or both) of your prior limits.

Also check plots are stable to increasing num_bins, and note that setting prior limits changes whether calculated marginalized limits are one or two tail. Please read the CosmoMC readme for more information.

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