29AAAADC67DED11189120000F87A36500211CB43@ADD-EX1">It is the nature of the constraints that interests me. I am willing to acceptWhile I do think that this is a disadvantage, that wasn't my point. My
argument was based on a criteria type approach to approval, where approval
passes all these strategy criteria by virtue of never having to
order-reverse. I was pointing out that this was a non-argument, because the
only reason it is true is that the preferences you can express are
constrained. With more detail, any system will fail these tests.
Approval's constraints because I believe they are beneficial or at least
benign. I do not like the constraints imposed by most other methods because
they are not always benign.
29AAAADC67DED11189120000F87A36500211CB43@ADD-EX1">Given your SU rankings (A > C > D > B), it strikes me that you are using aIt is worth noting that there is no way of ensuring a consistently high SU
result. There are bad SU scenarios in any method - in Approval (with all
voters using zero info above mean strategy);
Sincere Utilities (out of 100);
20% A-60; B-40; C-40; D-0 Approval vote ABC
20% A-100; D-40; C-20; B-5 Approval vote A
60% D-6; B-3; C-2; A-0 Approval vote DB
B wins in Approval, followed by D then A, then C. B is the worst SU
candidate, and D is the second worst. A (who comes third in Approval) has
an SU rating which is nearly as high as all of the other candidates
combined. Obviously the worst case scenario is pretty much the same for any
election method.
different definition of SU than I am. When I speak of SU, I am referring to
an L1-normalized SU. Does this contradict an accepted definition of SU?
If we calculate SUs according to this method, then we get (D > B > A > C).
So Approval picked the second-highest SU.
Note that B was acceptable to the ABC and DB voters by a fairly small margin,
which is why the top SU candidate was not picked. If slightly more than 20% of
the voters (either faction) had found B to be less acceptable, then D would have
been the winner.
I suspect you are using absolute SU calculations. If we accept this method then
we would indeed conclude that B has a poor SU in spite of appealing to two
factions of voters who otherwise have no common candidates (so B succeeds as
a compromise).
As I stated in my earlier rebuttal, SU is not the central theme of my campaign
for Approval voting (expressing intensity of preference is). However, I think
the tendency towards higher SU in Approval voting (using normalized utilities)
is a direct by-product of Approval's expressivity.
29AAAADC67DED11189120000F87A36500211CB43@ADD-EX1">I will. Using absolute utilities seems to be begging for a dilemma. If we acceptThis is also one of my criticisms of CR. Even when it is "sincere", the
utilities are generally weighted to give one candidate 100 and one candidate
0, which may bear no resemblance to actual utility values, but I won't go
into the problems with this.
the utilities in the example as absolute, then a "fair-minded" person would
conclude that the A voters should be given a lot more weight than the DB voters.
I don't think we are ready for this, no matter what election method we choose.
I could exaggerate my utilities to the point of declaring that candidate X is a
1000 and candidate Y is a zero. But I may have less real interest in the outcome
than another voter who is using a scale of 1 to 5. Nobody would ever know.
Except in mechanical systems (such as computer simulations) or where the outcome
has a directly measurable payoff to the voters (such as a monetary reward), I don't
believe in absolute utilities. They just don't make sense where human passions are
involved. Absolute utilities are the flip side of the "one man one vote" argument,
and just as specious.
Richard
