aiqbench analysis
This research introduces Lifted Bellman Linear Programming (LBLP), a novel framework for offline reinforcement learning that eliminates the need for target networks and EMA updates by enforcing in-sample Bellman optimality constraints. The proposed ALBUM algorithm achieves competitive performance on OGBench while significantly reducing parameter count and peak GPU memory usage compared to existing methods. By relaxing constraints into hinge penalties, the approach enables training with neural networks without relying on bootstrapped value targets, offering a more stable alternative for deterministic dynamics.
Lifted Bellman Linear Programming for Offline Reinforcement Learning
arXiv:2609.24489v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Offline reinforcement learning (RL) typically trains a critic by minimizing a regression loss against bootstrapped value targets stabilized by target networks with exponential moving average (EMA) updates. Multi-step targets incorporate behavior-policy actions and therefore require off-policy correction. We instead impose in-sample Bellman optimality on the critic through inequality constraints. We formulate the Lifted Bellman Linear Program (LBLP), which lifts the linear programming characterization of Bellman optimality to the joint $(Q,V)$ space so that every constraint involves only state-action pairs in the dataset. Its unique minimizer is the in-sample optimal pair, and constraints along $K$-step segments of dataset trajectories leave this minimizer unchanged for any rollout policy and horizon. Under deterministic dynamics, this minimizer lies between the best dataset return and the optimal value. Relaxing the constraints into hinge penalties recovers the same solution above a finite penalty coefficient in the tabular case. Approximate Lifted Bellman Unconstrained Minimization (ALBUM) implements this relaxation with neural networks and detaches the $K$-step rollout targets by stop gradient. Its objective contains no squared regression onto bootstrapped targets, so it can be trained without target networks or EMA updates. Under deterministic dynamics, the LBLP solution is a stationary point of the detached update under a coefficient condition independent of $\gamma$ and $K$, and the inequality constraints allow discounted returns along dataset trajectories to serve as lower bounds without off-policy correction or action chunking. On OGBench, ALBUM uses a single critic with a Gaussian policy, matches the average performance of FQL, and is comparable to recent action-chunking methods, while using the fewest parameters and the least peak GPU memory among all compared methods.
Abstract:Offline reinforcement learning (RL) typically trains a critic by minimizing a regression loss against bootstrapped value targets stabilized by target networks with exponential moving average (EMA) updates. Multi-step targets incorporate behavior-policy actions and therefore require off-policy correction. We instead impose in-sample Bellman optimality on the critic through inequality constraints. We formulate the Lifted Bellman Linear Program (LBLP), which lifts the linear programming characterization of Bellman optimality to the joint $(Q,V)$ space so that every constraint involves only state-action pairs in the dataset. Its unique minimizer is the in-sample optimal pair, and constraints along $K$-step segments of dataset trajectories leave this minimizer unchanged for any rollout policy and horizon. Under deterministic dynamics, this minimizer lies between the best dataset return and the optimal value. Relaxing the constraints into hinge penalties recovers the same solution above a finite penalty coefficient in the tabular case. Approximate Lifted Bellman Unconstrained Minimization (ALBUM) implements this relaxation with neural networks and detaches the $K$-step rollout targets by stop gradient. Its objective contains no squared regression onto bootstrapped targets, so it can be trained without target networks or EMA updates. Under deterministic dynamics, the LBLP solution is a stationary point of the detached update under a coefficient condition independent of $\gamma$ and $K$, and the inequality constraints allow discounted returns along dataset trajectories to serve as lower bounds without off-policy correction or action chunking. On OGBench, ALBUM uses a single critic with a Gaussian policy, matches the average performance of FQL, and is comparable to recent action-chunking methods, while using the fewest parameters and the least peak GPU memory among all compared methods.
Machine Learning (cs.LG); Artificial Intelligence (cs.AI)
arXiv:2609.24489 [cs.LG]
(or arXiv:2609.24489v1 [cs.LG] for this version)
https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2609.24489 Focus to learn more arXiv-issued DOI via DataCite (pending registration)
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