# HINTS: An alternative to NUTS that doesn't require gradients

**URL:** https://discourse.mc-stan.org/t/hints-an-alternative-to-nuts-that-doesnt-require-gradients/10017
**Category:** Algorithms
**Tags:** mcmc
**Created:** [August 1, 2019, 3:37pm UTC](https://discourse.mc-stan.org/t/hints-an-alternative-to-nuts-that-doesnt-require-gradients/10017 "2019-08-01T15:37:31Z")
**Posts on this page:** 1
**Showing post:** 25

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### Author: ![yizhang](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/discourse.mc-stan.org/yizhang/32/15673_2.png) [@yizhang](https://discourse.mc-stan.org/u/yizhang)
#### Post date: [September 12, 2019, 4:55pm UTC](https://discourse.mc-stan.org/t/hints-an-alternative-to-nuts-that-doesnt-require-gradients/10017/25 "2019-09-12T16:55:00Z")

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There are problems that I’m interested in such as inference of PDE/DDE that lack of gradient is a norm for existing solvers. I don’t know if HINTS is the answer but there’s certainly a market for non-gradient-based samplers.

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