On Jul 7, 2011, at 3:54 PM, Russ Paielli wrote:
Let me just elaborate on my concerns about complexity. Most of you
probably know most of this already, but let me just try to summ it
up and put things in perspective.
Some of the participants on this list are advanced mathematicians,
and they have been discussing these matters for years. As you all
know, the topic of election methods and voting systems can get very
complicated. As far as I know, there is still no consensus even on
this list on what is the best system. If there is no consensus here,
how can you expect to get a consensus among the general public?
Because we, hopefully, honor the different rules that make sense when
we are voting for the public, rather than what you properly complain
about.
But let's suppose a consensus is reached here on the EM list. What
happens next? You need to generate public awareness, which is a
major task. As far as the general public is concerned, there is no
problem with the voting system per se. Voters vote, and the votes
are counted. The candidate with the most votes wins. What else do
you need?
Need to start, before listening to your words, with how to let the
voters express their desires - something some of them realize need of
already.
So let's say we somehow manage to get widespread public awareness of
the deficiencies of the current plurality system. Then what?
Eventually, and actual change has to go through Congress. Try to
imagine Senator Blowhard grilling the experts on the proposed rules
of their favorite system. It would certainly be good for one thing:
fodder for Jon Stewart and Steven Colbert!
Congress is important for later - need to start with more lolcal
targets.
Also, consider the fierce opposition that would develop from any
group that thinks they would suffer. And who might that be? How
about the two major parties! Do you think they would have the power
to stop it? For starters, they would probably claim that any
"complicated" vote transfer algorithm cannot be used because it is
not in the Constitution.
Constitution? Anyway, need to have a plan to have some idea about who
might agree/oppose.
I realize that IRV has garnered considerable support and success. I
suppose that's a tribute to the "open-mindedness" of ultra-leftist
enclaves such as SF and Berkeley. On the other hand, it just goes to
show that a fundamentally flawed system can be sold in such enclaves.
Above you said selling would be undoable; here you say what should
never get bought has demonstrated possibility of selling such?
Dave Ketchum
Sorry if I'm coming across as negative. I'm just trying to be
realistic. I am a Republican, and I got interested again in the
whole EM thing because of what I see happening in the Republican
primary, with so many candidates to split the vote and so many
potential voters seemingly oblivious to the problem. I wish there
were a good, viable solution, but I just don't see it happening in
the foreseeable future.
--Russ P.
On Thu, Jul 7, 2011 at 12:11 PM, Dave Ketchum <[email protected]
> wrote:
Russ and Andrew each offer important thoughts.
Russ is right that overly complex methods will likely get rejected -
and I agree they deserve such, though Approval is not near to a
reasonable limit.
And Andrew is right that voters can accept something beyond
Approval. Reviewing the steps as voters might think of them:
. Approval is simply being able to voye for more than one, as if
equals - easy to vote and easy to implement, but makes you wish for
more.
. Condorcet adds ranking, so you can vote for unequals such as
Good that you truly like and Soso as second choice for being better
than Bad, that you would happily forget.
. Reasonable part of the ranking is ranking two or more as
equally ranked.
So I looked for what Andrew was referring to as CIVS - seems like it
deserves more bragging than I have heard. Voters can easily get
invited and vote via Internet in the flexibility doable that way.
Read more at http://www.cs.cornell.edu/andru/civs.html
Seems like CIVS would be good to use as is in many places where
voting via Internet makes sense - and shows using Condorcet -
something adaptable to the way we normally do elections.
Dave Ketchum
On Jul 6, 2011, at 1:48 PM, Andrew Myers wrote:
On 7/22/64 2:59 PM, Russ Paielli wrote:
...I eventually realized I was kidding myself to think that those
schemes will ever see the light of day in major public elections.
What is the limit of complexity that the general public will accept
on a large scale? I don't know, but I have my doubts that anything
beyond simple Approval will ever pass muster -- and even that will
be a hard sell.
My experience with CIVS suggests that ranking choices is perfectly
comprehensible to ordinary people. There have been more than 3,000
elections run using CIVS, and more than 60,000 votes cast. These are
not technically savvy voters for the most part. To pick a few groups
rather arbitrarily, CIVS is being used daily by plant fanciers,
sports teams, book clubs, music lovers, prom organizers, beer
drinkers, fraternities, church groups, PBeM gamers, and families
naming pets and (!) children.
If anything, to me ranking choices seems easier than Approval,
because the voter doesn't have to think about where to draw the
approve/disapprove cutoff, which I fear also encourages voters to
think strategically.
-- Andrew
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