Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote: > At 06:41 PM 4/24/2007, Juho wrote: >>> If you vote Approval style, you fail to express your true >>> appreciation of the candidates, and this can backfire. >> Yes, but typically/statistically Approval strategy improves the outcome. > > No. Check out Warren's simulations. Sincere voting (which means > expressing weak preferences as weak votes) produces the best > outcomes. Approval style produces acceptable outcomes, relative to > some other methods.
You are making assumptions about what is "best". On a side note: I still have not found the definition of the Individual Utility Function used in the simulations talked about at 'rangevoting.org'. I am willing to accept there Society Utility function as the Sum of Individual Utilities. Did they use U(v, c) = 1/R? Or did they use something else? how does the choice of the Utility function affect the simulation results. >>> I say that we are not going to really know until we see real >>> elections using Range. The alleged devolution to Approval is not a >>> serious harm. It would only mean that some ballot space and a >>> counting effort had been wasted. >> Yes, Range could be roughly as good as Approval (with some wasted >> effort, and ability to cast weak votes). The biggest hiccups might >> come in the form of people realizing that their vote was weak >> although they didn't understand that when they voted, or if some >> candidate won as a result of efficient use of strategic voting. > > That actually doesn't happen easily under Range (the latter). > Basically, the most "efficient" strategy for winning is to get as > many of your supporters as possible to bullet-vote for you. However, > this can backfire, if you offend those who might otherwise like you > but consider your recommendation that you vote against your favorite > to be quite offensive. I know it would offend me! Then how do you explain Voting cards! http://www.australianpolitics.com/images/qld/2001-htv-cook.jpg They are the an emergence of candidates telling voters how to vote. > > Can you imagine how it would look of a candidate steps in front of > the cameras and says: "Don't vote sincerely, it might cause me to > lose. Vote only for me!" > > Political suicide, that's what it would be, if the election were > Range. Instead, candidates, as now, will simply try to convince > voters that they are the best, and it is possible, but not certain, > that they will refrain, a little more, from trying to tear down their > opponents, for fear of alienating their supporters and thus losing those > votes. > >>>> Rating the least preferred candidate at 0 reduces the probability of >>>> that candidate getting elected (and doesn't carry any risks with it). >>> But from the conditions of the problem, there was no risk of that. >>> No, I don't buy it. (By the way, none of us involved with Range >>> would recommend giving the "least preferred candidate" any other >>> vote than the minimum. I assumed that PW was being given a 1 >>> because voters somewhat liked him, there were *worse* candidates >>> involved. >> There were no worse candidates involved. The voter liked PW somewhat. >> But since PW was the least liked candidate and the voter wanted to >> avoid electing him, giving him 0 was a perfect solution. (I thus used >> sincere utility based ratings instead of normalized ones.) > > And this is correct voting! Basically, the supposed "sincere" votes > from which the method devolved into Approval were ignorant votes. I'd > really suggest that ballot instructions be explicit, suggesting that > you vote the max for your favorite, the min for your least preferred, > and whatever you want for the rest.... Range votes are *relative* > votes. If there were a dozen candidates, and all were quite well > qualified, we still need to pick one and we will want to pick the > best. To get good information from the voters, we need them to > normalize their votes. Otherwise, the necessary resolution is lost. > If on some absolute scale, all the candidates are 10s, on what basis > would we choose between them? > > No, Range is about *relative* utility. But I prefer to think of voter > satisfaction. It is about rating candidates as to how satisfied you > will be if they are elected, with max rating meaning maximally > satisfied, and min rating meaning maximally dissatisfied. Relatively > speaking. You might actually be satisfied in an absolute sense with > any of them, or with none of them. > >>> But this contradicts the assumed initial sincere vote! If you want >>> this, why would you vote A=9, B=8 in the first place? By voting >>> this way, you are saying that B winning is almost as satisfactory >>> to you as A winning! >> The voter voted originally sincerely since voters were given the >> impression that they should write one's sincere preferences on the >> ballot. > > The ballot instructions were, "Write your sincere preferences on the ballot"? > > When you vote a ranked ballot, and some systems require full ranking, > you are putting one candidate at the top and one at the bottom. Some > allow you to put more than one in each of these positions, or in > intermediate positions. The method essentially normalizes your vote, > making it equivalent to a range of 0% to 100% in Range. But ranked > methods don't consider preferences strength, though some impute it, > in a way, by considering "defeat strength." > >> Candidate B winning would be quite satisfactory to this >> voter. The voter however wants to make A the winner if he can choose >> between A and B. If A and B were the only candidates, voting A=max, >> B=min would be also risk free. >> >>> I think that people can and will understand that democracy is often >>> about making compromises. It is *not* about crushing the opposition! >> I agree, but competitiveness exists despite of this, and that may >> lead to voting with maximum power etc. > > Range limits "maximum power" to one vote per voter. And we recommend > and generally assume that all voters, with rare exceptions, will vote > with maximum power. That is, they will rank one max and one min and > they will array the others as they choose. This is maximum power. It > won't "lead" to this condition, this *is* Range. > > >>> "Vote -1 to vote against a candidate, vote +1 to vote for the >>> candidate, and vote zero or leave a candidate unrated to have an >>> intermediate effect. The candidate with the greatest sum of votes >>> will win." >> Note that negative votes carry some risks. > > The issue here is where the default vote is for abstentions. The > standard in original Range proposals was that it was zero, > effectively. Average vote disregards abstentions, which is its own > problem and requires a "quorum rule" to avoid obvious bad outcomes. > Using negative votes is a means of making the default be other than > zero, that's all. The range I suggested makes the default be midrange. > > >> Let's say there are three >> major parties with one candidate each, and many totally unknown >> candidates. All major parties are afraid of each others and will give >> lots of negative votes to both competing party candidates. The sum of >> all major party candidates may go below 0. > > This situation is a setup for a bad outcome. Be careful not to blame > the voting method for the total disarray and disunity of the > electorate! Given the setup, it is not clear that there is *any* good outcome! > >> Some unknown candidate is >> mentioned only in very few ballots (let's say his/her family members >> supporting and one neighbour opposing). His score will however be >> positive and he will be elected, not the well known candidates whose >> score was negative. > > That's correct. But something was totally neglected in this analysis. > That candidate is only going to have a couple of votes above zero. > But the conditions were that there were *many* candidates. Surely > there is at least one of them who is well-enough known and > well-enough liked that the candidate gets more than a couple of votes! > > Really, if it is true that there are more people in a society opposed > to a candidate than favor him or her, do you think the candidate > should be elected! There is a simple solution to the problem given, > which is a ratification step or runoff. (Not a top-two runoff, but a > runoff between, say, the votes analyzed as sum and the votes analyzed > as raw, abstentions zero.) > > The problem, if it is a problem -- I'm not sure it is -- could be > addressed by setting the default lower: > > -1: Disliked > 0: Acceptable > 1: Good > 2: Preferred. > > Or, alternatively, the simpler Range 3 implementation with blank > votes defined as -1/2 vote. Or perhaps even some smaller negative > value, like -1/10. Something to reflect the value that the winner, > preferably, should be well enough known that the candidate is rated > by most voters. > > This is a question regarding how to treat blank votes. It's an > unresolved issue among Range advocates. > > > > > > > > > > > >>> [I suggested that there be a runoff between the Range winner and a >>> Condorcet winner, if they differ] >>>> Let's assume that a Condorcet winner exists. In this case this method >>>> could be said to be a method where the voters are given a second >>>> chance to think again if the Range winner could be seen as a "good >>>> compromise" even though the majority could easily vote as in the >>>> first round and elect the Condorcet winner. >>> Yes. That is, the original ballot analysis showed that this C. >>> winner was rated higher than the Range winner on a majority of >>> ballots. >>> >>>> I'm not sure this method >>>> would be a very practical method in real life large elections but in >>>> principle the idea of "recommending" the Range winner to the voters >>>> is a positive idea. Some strategies where people would try to >>>> influence who the Range winner will be could take place (i.e. the >>>> Range winner of the second round would not be the sincere range >>>> winner). >>> I think Juho means that the Range winner of the *first* round would >>> not be the sincere Range winner. If there is a second round, it is >>> not held as a Range election. It is a straight which-of-these-two- >>> shall-be-elected vote. Voters will know, this time, if the first >>> election was sincere, which candidate will be most broadly >>> acceptable. Which is more important to them, for their preference >>> to win or for the most broadly acceptable candidate to win? >>> Majority rule. >>> >>> I'd suggest that if their preference was weak, the majority might >>> prefer the Range winner, on reflection. But if their preference was >>> strong, they might insist upon it. >> If the first round votes were sincere the Condorcet winner will be >> preferred over the Range winner by majority (since the definition of >> Condorcet winner says so). The Range winner would however be better >> if measured as sum of satisfaction of the voters (if that is what the >> voters marked in the ballots). The opinions could however change >> before the second round as a result of publishing the fact that there >> was a Range winner that was different from the Condorcet winner, and >> the range winner could be supported by a majority at the second round >> (depends on the level of competitiveness etc.). >> >> Juho >> >> >> >> >> >> ___________________________________________________________ >> The all-new Yahoo! Mail goes wherever you go - free your email >> address from your Internet provider. http://uk.docs.yahoo.com/nowyoucan.html >> ---- >> election-methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info > > ---- > election-methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info ---- election-methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
