# The Everlasting Database: Statistical Validity at a Fair Price

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/1803.04307 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/1803.04307/

## Key facts

- Cited by 1 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- First posted on arXiv 12 Mar 2018.

## Built on by (most cited first, 1 of 1)

- [Adversarial Laws of Large Numbers and Optimal Regret in Online Classification](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2101.09054/) (2021)

## Abstract (arXiv)

The problem of handling adaptivity in data analysis, intentional or not, permeates a variety of fields, including test-set overfitting in ML challenges and the accumulation of invalid scientific discoveries. We propose a mechanism for answering an arbitrarily long sequence of potentially adaptive statistical queries, by charging a price for each query and using the proceeds to collect additional samples. Crucially, we guarantee statistical validity without any assumptions on how the queries are generated. We also ensure with high probability that the cost for M non-adaptive queries is O(log M), while the cost to a potentially adaptive user who makes M queries that do not depend on any others is O(√M).