<title>Bayesian versus 'plain-vanilla Bayesian' multitarget statistics</title>

Abstract

Finite-set statistics (FISST) is a direct generalization of single-sensor, single-target Bayes statistics to the multisensor-multitarget realm, based on random set theory. Various aspects of FISST are being investigated by several research teams around the world. In recent years, however, a few partisans have claimed that a "plain-vanilla Bayesian approach" suffices as down-to-earth, "straightforward," and general "first principles" for multitarget problems. Therefore, FISST is mere mathematical "obfuscation." In this and a companion paper I demonstrate the speciousness of these claims. In this paper I summarize general Bayes statistics, what is required to use it in multisensor-multitarget problems, and why FISST is necessary to make it practical. Then I demonstrate that the "plain-vanilla Bayesian approach" is so heedlessly formulated that it is erroneous, not even Bayesian denigrates FISST concepts while unwittingly assuming them, and has resulted in a succession of algorithms afflicted by inherent -- but less than candidly acknowledged -- computational "logjams."