At 09:04 AM 12/26/2008, Michael Allan wrote:
Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:
> "Alienated" should be considered a relative term. Compared to what?
The standard for an *alienable* medium is money. Spend it, and it's
gone forever. A vote is like that. Cast a vote, and it's gone. Not
quite forever, but for a long time. (Caveat elector.)
Yes. I've come to the conclusion that the power of a single vote is
actually a motivation for sincere voting, with the right system. It's
been inaccurately claimed that optimal strategy in Range is the
approval style vote, but this neglects part of the situation, most
notably possible uncertainty in the voter's assessment of the voting
environment and the value to the voter of a simple, sincerely expressive vote.
A voter who gets a poor outcome with a sincere vote will experience
less emotional regret than one who gets the same outcome, facilitated
by an insincere vote. Standard utility analysis has completely
neglected this weighting. The result of accurately simulating it
would be a voter preference toward the sincere vote, with distortion
only arising when strategic considerations are *strong* -- which
requires good knowledge of the environment.
The standard for an *inalienable* medium is human thought, or perhaps
free speech. I can hold an opinion to myself, and I can also express
it. Either way it still belongs to me. If new information comes to
light, I can always change my opinion, and even "take back" what I
said. Compared to that, voting falls short. I cannot take my vote
back and I cannot change it, not unless the voting is continuous.
That's right. However, a compromise is found with short-term Asset
Voting, where the voter may vote with *maximal* sincerity, for a
candidate the voter knows personally, or relatively directly. This
may indeed flip, from some misbehavior, but it is far less likely to
do so, to result in serious discord between the electorate and the
Asset electors. Then, the actual assembly seats are elected by a
process that *may* be reversible.
There are two paths to reversibility. One would be a process whereby
an elector revokes a vote assignment; the other would be a process
whereby the elector directly casts a vote on a matter before the
assembly. The latter process, if in place, would make discrimination
possible: I trust the seat I voted for, *generally*, but she is a bit
wacko on this subject!
The former process would take place when there is a major failure of
overall trust.
I would build some hysteresis into the process. If the electors can
name proxies for the exercise of their votes, the loss of default
voting power for a rejected seat may be immediate, and all that
happens as continuing harm is some wacky representation in
deliberation, which is pretty much harmless. A non-seat proxy could
exercise the votes of those who have withdrawn.
(If voting is a matter of entering a user name and password on a web
site, a voter could entrust their user name and password to someone
else; revoking that by changing the password, and the real elector
could at any time request a password being sent to their email
address, this is standard process, actually. It's pretty secure. And
the few exceptions could be dealt with by a process that verifies
actual identity; the real elector would file a statement under
penalty of perjury that they have lost access illegitimately, and the
voting right would be suspended until it was resolved, which would
normally be quite quickly. And it would be fraud to exercise the vote
of an elector without the permission of the elector, i.e., after
notice that the permission was withdrawn. This is, I think, pretty
standard proxy law.)
(The distinction is important in social theory. Alienable media are
associated with intrumental/strategic action, and non-alienable with
communicative action. Not sure if there's anything in that...)
Makes sense to me. This is part of FA/DP theory.
>> But if the votes were open to recasting in real time...
>
> It's Delegable Proxy. That is the principal difference between Delegable
> Proxy -- which is continuously reassignable -- and Asset Voting. ...
Can you point me to the original description of DP? I'm looking for a
source I can cite.
Well ... I'm perhaps the number one source on it. What do you want me to say?
Seriously, there was an article on Wikipedia. It was deleted
primarily due to lack of published sources, confused by
misunderstanding my involvement in the article. I hadn't actually
edited the article in a long, time, once I realized the issue of
conflict of interest; I'd originally edited the article on Liquid
democracy, which later was changed by someone else to Delegable
proxy. Now, in fact, there are some sources, but it wasn't called by
that name.
You might look at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Delegable_proxy
The article on Delegated Voting wasn't deleted, but was Redirected to
Proxy voting. Because it wasn't deleted, you can still read the article at
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Delegated_voting&oldid=197094901
(Wikipedia is quirky. Merge was clearly the appropriate action for
the Delegable proxy article, if there was *some* value to the article
and if it might become notable someday. Merge is an editorial
decision, and is often accompanied by much less fuss than a Deletion.
Both actions, Deletion and Merge, leave the article in the database,
the only difference is that with Merge, the article still exists, but
if you enter the name of the article, you are redirected to the
target article. At the top there is then a link back to the original
article ("redirected from ... [link]). Then, in History, you can see
all the old versions of the article, and the Talk page remains as
well. Absidy and I argued long and hard that Deletion should be
reserved for true garbage. But there are fanatic "deletionists," some
of whom showed up in the debate I linked above. Material in a merged
article is only seen in History, and that isn't searchable by the
googlebots, so all the "vanity" arguments are totally moot. It's a
common accusation in deletion discussion when the creator or editor
of an article has something to do with the topic. It's really moot,
and there are Wikipedia documents saying so, but the argument is
still made. The question should solely be the article itself, not who
made it. Deletion isn't punishment, or it shouldn't be. The deletion
discussion, though, did come up on Wikipedia because Absidy did
propose delegable proxy for Wikipedia, which is an application crying
for it if I ever saw one. The application was either (1) roundly
misunderstood, and that is clearly true. Delegable proxy wasn't
really being proposed as a voting method, but as a *representational*
method, for bidirectional communication. (2) it *was* understood, by
those who would feel threatened if the average Wikipedia editor, who
doeesn't have the time to get involved in the very tedious debates
that go around and around in circles on Wikipedia, were empowered,
which delegable proxy would do. I vote for the former. It's
ignorance, not avarice for continued power. They really don't
understand, which has been my general experience. It seems to take,
for most people, at least a year of exposure for the idea for it to
*start* to sink in.
I might ask to recover the deleted Delegable proxy article and its
Talk page. There was some stuff added there which may be of use. A
copy of the article was ported to the Election Methods wiki:
http://wiki.electorama.com/wiki/Delegable_proxy
The BeyondPolitics wiki that was linked there is largely gone, due to
bugs in the update process for the TikiWiki installation that existed
there. I haven't had -- or haven't taken -- the time to fix it.
Meanwhile http://beyondpolitics.org goes to a new MediaWiki
installation, with little content.
The wayback machine for BeyondPolitics.org should have most of the older stuff.
http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://beyondpolitics.org
There is also James Armytage-Green's page on delegable proxy:
http://fc.antioch.edu/~james_green-armytage/vm/proxy.htm
Where I have differed from his work and the work of others is in
having a vision of how to get from here to there.
Delegable proxy can be used within what might be called a judicial
system, or advice system, where what is important is the
trustworthiness of the advice, and, as pointed out by Montesquieu
long ago, mixing advice (judgement) with power causes the corruption of both.
Hence my concept of using Delegable Proxy within Free Associations,
which are organizations which do not collect power (beyond a certain
kind of power that is represented by being a trusted advisor, a power
that is easily lost by giving bad or corrupt advice). Such
associations, I believe, could very easily function to negotiate
broad consensus very efficiently, even on a large scale. Delegable
proxy sets up what should be an efficient, intelligently filtered
bidirectional (inward-outward) communication network, where every
member chooses the filter.
Some writers have been concerned about proxy loops, but I consider
them unavoidable, in the first place (the alternative implies a
superproxy, one person who represents everyone, which *might* be
dangerous!), with the harm limited to lack of representation in some
discussions, a situation which is easily remediable if the members of
the loop want to remedy it.
There is no harm at all if at least one member of the loop participates.
Using delegable proxy within Free Associations thus finesses the
security problem, and other problems having to do with the untried
nature of the system. It is actually only a formalization of what
already happens to some degree. Those who participate represent those
who don't, and when a serious imbalance results, more participate
(which can create quite a mess!). DP prevents lower participation
from becoming a mess. It self-adjusts.
Then, if a Free Association, which is designed with rules that remove
impediments to practically unlimited growth -- beyond the normal
impediment of inertia and cynicism, which will disappear as FAs of a
certain size arise -- becomes large enough, its coherent advice
becomes a powerful force. If it cannot find coherent advice, the
influence of its factions tend to cancel out. Thus it only has power
if it can find some level of consensus.
With large FA/DP organziations active, existing voting systems become
simply methods of ratifying the consensus. Plurality works! (But why
not use better methods, some of them are cheap!)
And, of course, there is Asset Voting (Warren Smith). Also called
Candidate proxy (Mike Ossipiff and Forest Simmons). Not only does
this implement a kind of secret-ballot delegable proxy, an FA/DP
organization of electors could serve to efficiently negotiate the
vote reassignments needed to create assembly seats, and, as well, to
maintain communication between electors, and to advise those with seats.
I do not consider "delegated representation," where the votes of
proxies are supposed to represent the opinions of the clients, to be
a good thing. Rather, it is far better for clients to entrust proxies
with the power of independent decision; besides, the delegated voting
concept doesn't scale well. A proxy representing 100,000 voters
should vote what he thinks the clients want? Obviously, client views
are important, but the whole point of choosing someone trustworthy
for the office is to choose someone who is in a good position,
participating in deliberation, reviewing as much of the evidence as
possible, to make a trustable decision. Otherwise, we would simply go
to mass voting by robotic representation.... *That* is an idea that
would be highly dangerous, easily manipulable through mass media, etc.
Delegable proxy, where what is delegated is the representational
power, not some specific issue position or even a set of positions,
is as safe from this as I can imagine. And so would a mature Asset
Voting system, which could become, effectively, delegable proxy,
while still retaining the power in the hands of the electors, who
*can* vote continuously, in effect. But they will rarely need to do so....
> ... people understanding that if they
> give their votes to a massively popular politician, they get far less than
> they do if they give it to someone they can sit down and talk with on
> occasion. In the latter case, they gain a communications channel, in the
> former, they simply support an image they have been presented.
Do you have a citeable source for that, too?
It would be me. I wrote that. To my knowledge, I'm the only one who
saw the implications in Asset Voting, that once votes would not be
wasted, even if given to a "candidate" who only gets one vote (the
voter himself?), voters can make the choice without any constriction
at all, beyond the natural constrictions of the situation.
(Under "difficult conditions," it might be necessary for candidates
registering to be electors to secretly name a proxy or the like, to
receive their votes if they get less than N votes. I'd like to see
this to deal with the problem of unexpected elector incapacity, but
it also might be needed when there is massive possible coercion.
Then, electors who got less than N votes would simply know that they
didn't get that number, they would not know *who* "betrayed" them.
And N is large enough that the resources of the state can be devoted
to protecting the remaining electors. It looks more like an extended
proportional representation system here, or what is called Candidate
List, where candidates publish a list of vote reassignments to be
used if they aren't elected. But I don't think that, for example,
such modifications -- which create new security problems, who watches
the watchers? -- would be necessary in the U.S. for example. Iraq, maybe.)
>> [1]. Lewis Carroll. 1884. The Principles of Parliamentary
>> Representation. Harrison and Sons. London.
>
> Carroll was the first I know of to propose votes transferable by the first
> preference candidate...
And if I understand, that entails *recursive* transfer? I'll need a
source for that, too. I'd better read Carroll...
No, it doesn't imply delegable proxy, itself. The idea was that the
transfer was under the direct control of the candidate receiving the
vote. I've proposed that electors (candidates with votes, that's all,
who may recast these votes publicly) might use delegable proxy to
facilitate their own process, which becomes more necessary if there
come to be *many* electors, but I wouldn't do much more with proxies
than allow electors to name a proxy, not delegable (possibly). It
might be delegable, but what's important is that the elector can
revoke the single assignment at any time.
When the number of electors becomes very large, delegable proxy, used
for direct votes in the Assembly, could become quite useful.
But I wouldn't write it into the first applications. Simple: Asset
Voting to create a proportional representation assembly. Probably
fixed term as a first step, no revocation, etc. The elector body
still exists to advise the seats. No direct voting at first. But it
becomes an obvious reform that would decrease the distance between
the Assembly and the people.
And that's the problem that I'm most concerned about addressing: the
sense of distance and separation between people and government.
Government, too easily, becomes "them." It should be "us." When we
have open channels for participation, which a mature Asset system
with small-scale selection of electors and large-scale concentration
using delegable proxy, into an Assembly where each seat has fixed
default voting power, it would, I'd predict, be "us."
Proxy democracy has been suggested, Absidy found some references, for
political application, about a century past. The idea was that each
member of a city council would have votes on the council proportional
to the votes they received. While it's an interesting idea, it
suffers from a very serious problem. The focus of power can become
too great. When there is an excessive focus of power, there is an
attractive target for corruption. By distributing power among a large
set of peers, corruption becomes far more expensive.
The possibility of corruption has been suggested as a hazard for
delegable proxy, but what these analyists have missed is the
supervisory nature of the structure, the clients supervise the proxy.
They can't control him, but they can advise him, and they expect
responses that make sense. If they don't get those responses, they
can and will change their proxy assignment, or if it's just on a
single issue, they will vote directly.
Imagine some corporation, desiring some outcome, bribes a prominent
proxy. In an Asset system, if the "proxy" has a seat, this gets them
one vote, it would be expensive, but maybe it might be worthwhile
under some circumstances. However, there is a risk: the proxy says to
them, "Thank you very much, I'll enjoy the money." And he says to his
direct clients -- who would, themselves, be highly trusted electors
--, secretly (he knows them personally and trusts them), "I've been
offered a huge payment and I can use the money. So, be advises, I'm
going to support this corrupt proposal, I'll try to convince you, in
our public communications, that it's a good idea. I don't think so.
If you don't like it, I'd suggest voting directly."
The corporation gets a mouthful of hair. Alternatively, perhaps the
bribe is conditional on success. (Not a great idea for the seat to
accept it, how is he going to enforce it?) The high-level electors
will still smell a rat, most likely. They are massively trusted, it
won't be a very rare thing for them to take an interest in actual legislation.
No, I think corrupting a delegable proxy system, when the massive
concentration of power in a single stage is unusual or nonexistent,
would be very difficult, so risky and expensive that corporations
would be better off, it would be more profitable, if they spend their
money trying to better serve the public. Which is what we want, right?
> I haven't been able to find the original pamphlet yet, it's expensive to
> buy the collection it is in. Eventually, I'll get it.
My library has originals. If I can make a copy, I'll send it to you.
Please. I'll send you my address by separate mail. Or you can email me scans.
> I don't know that he realized the deeper implications, that this tweak to
> STV could become the whole show, and lead to quasi-direct democracy. Once
> there are electors holding votes, and those votes are cast publicly, the
> problem of scale that afflicts direct democracy and is generally
considered
> insoluble, is solved -- or reduced by an order or by orders of magnitude.
None of this has been explored, I don't think.
My sense is that my work has been original. Delegable proxy, itself,
was widely and independently invented, over the last decade or so. I
was working on it maybe thirty years ago, but not in writing.
However, when Warren Smith showed me his Asset Voting system, I
immediately recognised it as a form of delegable proxy, and I already
knew that DP would work best when the proxy assignments were
small-scale, where the proxy and client could easily communicate directly.
And who would want to be represented by someone who one can't raise
on the phone, or sit down and chat with in an office or elsewhere?
Not me! Not if I have a choice. Sure, as an ordinary voter, I won't
ordinarily be able, just from that, to easily talk to my
representative in an assembly for, say, the State of Massachusetts.
I'll have to be content with a staffer. (By the way, this is a bit
how the existing system works, particularly when the staff is good
and really does digest and understand what the citizen is saying.
Delegble proxy would incorporate this kind of functionality, but
would be a bit more efficient at the movement of information. It can
be very frustrating to call up the office of a representative and
meet with a blank wall. Very polite, to be sure, but clearly no
understanding. I once wrote to Jerry Springer, who had stated on the
radio that direct democracy was impossible, giving the classical
reason (scale). I pointed out that this was not exactly true, because
*chosen* representation was possible, and could accomplish the
necessary reduction of scale, all it takes is some layers so that
deliberation is possible at all levels. I got a nice mail back from
some staffer thanking me for my interest. No response that showed any
understanding at all.
My proxy would understand! And would know whom, on the next level up
(levels informally appear with DP), to talk with, perhaps, but not
limited to, his or her own proxy. And so on. An idea would rise until
it meets *cogent* objection, which would then go back down, always
through relationships of rapport. I'd get an answer, quite possible
an answer that would show me why my great idea wasn't. But if my idea
is really sound, I might be able to answer the objection, convince my
proxy -- if I can't convince my proxy, who in the world *can* I
convince? -- and thus the idea goes back up, this time with a
persistence marker which will slightly increase attention.
It's little less than mass intelligence, a device for "thinking" on a
large scale. And that's a lot more important than voting! Voting is
just about the outcome....
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