MIKE OSSIPOFF wrote: > Though election-utility depends on an assumption that might be > more approximate than the assumptions that Weber-Tideman uses, > all the inputs for these methods are approximate anyway, and so > it's questionable whether any serious loss of accuracy results when > using approximate methods.
That's a fair enough statement. All the inputs are *inferred* from some known data points, such as the results of a poll, or the results of a previous election. The variations due to the assumptions behind the inference can outweigh the variations between the different approximations and the exact method. For example, in the zero-info example I gave a while back with 12 voters, I assumed a binomial distribution with each candidate having a 50% chance of getting approval from each voter. But if the other voters are aware that they should be using a few-voters strategy, perhaps a 40% chance would have been a better assumption. Also, my assumption gave equal probability to a voter voting for no candidates, all candidates, or any given combination of candidates, so I know it's going to be a little off. And I didn't account for the possibility of no-shows, or the possibility that there may be more voters than the 12 I'm aware of. I think in non-zero-info cases, if the inference is based on each candidate's probable vote totals and margin of error from a reliable Approval-style poll, then the inference is supported by statistical evidence, and therefore the resulting strategy is more reliable than the zero-info, few-voters strategy. Whether it's important to a voter to actually go through the math, rather than use an approximate strategy (or even just rely on his/her instincts), is up to that voter. But it wouldn't be difficult to write an open-source computer program that would be available to everyone who wanted to go that route. And for zero-info, many-voters cases, the above-average utility method is always accurate. -- Richard ---- For more information about this list (subscribe, unsubscribe, FAQ, etc), please see http://www.eskimo.com/~robla/em
