2011/8/5 Dave Ketchum <[email protected]> > Brought out for special thought: > > rating is easier than ranking. You can express this computationally, by > saying that ranking requires O(n²) pairwise comparisons of candidates (or > perhaps for some autistic savants who heap-sort in their head, O[n log(n)]), > while rating requires O(n) comparisons of candidates against an absolute > scale. You can express it empirically; this has been confirmed by ballot > spoilage rates, speed, and self-report in study after study. > > > This somehow does not fit as to rating vs ranking. I look at A and B, > doing comparisons as needed, and assign each a value to use: > . For ranking the values can show which exist: A<B, A=B, or A>B, and > can be used as is unless they need to be converted to whatever format may be > acceptable. >
I'm sorry, I don't understand this sentence. > . For rating the values need to be scaled. > There is no need to scale rating values for MJ. In fact, it is not the intention. A vote of "Nader=Poor, Gore=Good, Bush=Fair" is perfectly valid and probably fully strategic even on a ballot which includes "Unacceptable, Poor, Fair, Good, Excellent". > Thus what needs doing is a trivial bit of extra effort for rating. The > comparison effort was shared. > > "Ballot spoilage rates" also puzzle. Where can I find what magic lets > non-Condorcet have less such than Condorcet, for I do not believe such magic > exists, unless Condorcet is given undeserved problems. > Right, I was thinking of strict ranking when I wrote that part. > > On Aug 5, 2011, at 8:57 AM, Jameson Quinn wrote: > > If I understand Robert correctly, I think that his concern is to find > whichever system gets good results, while still leaving the voters' job > crystal-clear. In particular, the first priority would be to find a system > which puts the minimum burden of strategic thinking on the voter. Insofar as > it's consistent with this first priority, his other priorities are to > simplify the ballot and to elect a better winner. > > He says that he finds Condorcet to beat Range, Approval, IRV, and Plurality > on those priorities. I can't say I disagree. There is no question that the > average voter can get away with less strategizing under Condorcet than under > any of those systems. Range and Approval both give significantly more power > to a voter who can correctly guess which two candidates are the > frontrunners; and a conscientious voter simply can't leave it up to the law > of averages to balance out that power between themself and those crazies on > the other side. And IRV and Plurality both require lesser-evil thinking and > favorite betrayal, which is worse. > > But I would contend that, just as clearly, both Majority Judgment and SODA > beat Condorcet by these criteria. These are two very-different systems, so > I'll tackle them separately. > > Why is Majority Judgment easier on the voter than Condorcet? First and > foremost, because rating is easier than ranking. You can express this > computationally, by saying that ranking requires O(n²) pairwise comparisons > of candidates (or perhaps for some autistic savants who heap-sort in their > head, O[n log(n)]), while rating requires O(n) comparisons of candidates > against an absolute scale. You can express it empirically; this has been > confirmed by ballot spoilage rates, speed, and self-report in study after > study. You can look at the trend of websites - Yelp, IMDB, Amazon, and an > interminable etc., all use ratings. HotOrNot explicitly experimented with > FaceMash-style comparisons and found that even a single two-way comparison > was harder for users than ratings. > > Second, MJ has, if anything, less of a strategic incentive than Condorcet. > Balinski and Laraki found that, in a simulation seeded by real polled > ballots from the 2007 French presidential election, the MJ result was more > likely to be stable under strategy than the Condorcet result. Warren Smith > has argued that, if you know who the two frontrunners are, a Condorcet > burial strategy is essentially risk-free, while saving cognitive effort. In > MJ, on the other hand, chances are that your honest vote is already getting > all possible benefits from such a strategy. > > The last two paragraphs may seem counterintuitive to people who are used to > thinking of ratings ballots in Range terms. That's because, in Range, some > amount of strategic thinking is almost totally inevitable. It would be > ridiculous to mark a Range ballot by simply rating each candidate on an > absolute scale, without normalizing so that you marked at least one max and > one min vote. And voting power continues to increase as you move towards an > approval-style ballot. With MJ, on the other hand, even a non-normalized > vote with no max or min ratings could well have full strategic voting > power. > > As to ballot simplicity, it's partly a matter of taste. I'd say that MJ has > the edge over Condorcet, but you might disagree. Of course, it would be > possible to do Condorcet with a rated ballot, but since I don't know anyone > who seriously advocates that, I'm neglecting that possibility. > > > Condorcet can use THE SAME values as rating - the ratings show what is > needed to identify A<B, A=B, and A>B. > Right, that's what I was trying to say. But I said that I think most people don't actually suggest pressing for doing it that way in real life. > > For results, I think that MJ and Condorcet both do more than well enough. > Is it better to have the candidate who makes some majority happiest, as in > MJ, or the one who has majorities over all the others, as in Condorcet? On > principle, it's hard to say. In the end, I definitely sympathize with Warren > that BR is the best measure of results (while disagreeing that results > should be the end-all criterion). I haven't seen BR results for MJ, but > based on its similarity to Range and MCA, I'd suspect MJ clearly beats > Condorcet by this measure. > > If you want to read more about MJ, the place to start are the papers on > Laraki's > home page <http://sites.google.com/site/ridalaraki/majority-judgment>. > These are pro-MJ papers, but honestly, I've found that I got more > understanding even of MJ's flaws from reading these critically, than I did > from reading the couple of shoddy anti-MJ papers that you'll find in a > Google scholar search. > > .... > > As to SODA, the case is also clear. Less need for strategic thinking than > Condorcet? Check. Simpler ballots? In spades. Good results? If voting blocs > tend to be well-defined so that voters agree with their favorite candidates > — not too excessive an assumption in an ideological, partisan election — > then the CW will win in SODA more often than in Condorcet! That is to say, > honesty will be the strategic equilibrium in SODA, and lead to a CW win; but > in Condorcet, strategy could confound this. In practice, I think that the > only case where the CW will not win SODA is when they're an > relatively-unknown centrist. Such a person can become the CW precisely > because voters do not know their flaws; but in SODA, the other candidates > will evaluate that person much more carefully before they transfer a winning > pile of votes to an unknown. > > .... > > I've been actively interested in voting systems for going on two decades > now, and sometimes it's frustrating. We continue to argue amongst ourselves > between system A and system B, we continue to invent new system Z, while the > rest of the world basically ignores us. > > In that time, it seems as if I've favored everything under the sun. If I > remember correctly, I've gone from Borda, to IRV, to Condorcet, to Range, to > Approval, to Asset, to Bucklin, to Bucklin-which-I-called-MCA, to MJ, back > to Approval, to SODA. So I think I can pretty fairly say that I'm not > fixated on any one system. I also think that I understand the arguments in > favor of different systems. > > And I honestly have more hope on this issue right now than I have for some > time. SODA could be the winning combo. Yes, perhaps I'm biased, because I > helped invent it. But if you look at that list of what I've supported, you > won't see any other systems where I'd done more than minor tweaks around the > edges. And that's not for lack of opportunity; I've invented many systems of > my own. It's because I always wanted to back a system which had other > supporters, because we're not going to accomplish anything each working > alone. > > What's so great about SODA? I think it would entirely liberate voters from > having to think about strategy. I know that it is the simplest possible task > for the voter. And I expect that it would give great results. These are R > B-J's three criteria, as I understand them, and I agree with them. I know > that other people here might put them in a different order; for instance, > the Range advocates would probably put results (that is, BR) first. > > SODA has problems, too. It's an obscure system invented yesterday. And it > doesn't even really lend itself to publishable results; it's hard to prove > anything about it or even do a monte-carlo simulation without making > questionable assumptions about how much or how little voting blocs agree > with their favored candidate. Finally, it cannot work unless the candidates > are human beings; it can't evaluate options without attaching them to > spokespeople. But those problems are can be addressed, one way or another, > with enough time and effort. > > I'd still enthusiastically vote for almost any reform to Plurality - > certainly any of the systems except Borda that I listed as having supported. > But I have hope that EM researchers and advocates can start coming together > as we never have before. I'm not saying that everyone will agree with me. I > wouldn't even want for debate to stop. But I think that now is the time to > start laying the first foundations of a new unity, and if you ask me right > now, SODA has the strength to be the cornerstone. > > I hope this does not sound too arrogant. Certainly, I am humbled by the > many tasks before us. And no matter how rousingly optimistic my rhetoric, > experience reminds me that getting even two of us to agree on anything is > always harder than you think. > > But still; I remain: > > Hopefully y'rs, > Jameson Quinn > > 2011/8/4 robert bristow-johnson <[email protected]> > >> >> On Aug 4, 2011, at 3:20 AM, bob wrote: >>> >>>> >>>> --- In [email protected], "thenewthirdparty" >>>> <thenewthirdparty@...> wrote: >>>> >>>>> >>>>> Guys and Gals, >>>>> I now see Range Voting as a very important component to getting third >>>>> parties elected. But I don't see how the Range Voting group will ever >>>>> change the minds of the public in order for it to be a reality. >>>>> >>>> >> and they haven't changed my mind about it, even though i'm not opposed to >> election policy reform nor of moving past FPP. i fully recognize why the >> simple vote-for-one ballot (either FPP or delayed-top-two-runoff) >> disadvantages third-party and independent candidates. >> >> this was a point i brought up during in Burlington IRV debate: one of the >> vocal opponents to IRV was, 3 years previously, a minor candidate for mayor >> in Burlington Vermont. i would almost say a non-serious candidate, but he >> got on the ballot (his name is Loyal Ploof). now he lost to the Prog >> candidate who was elected in 2006 and he was a sorta anti-establishment >> rabble rouser (if he could get a rabble). >> >> now (i told them this), suppose i'm standing in the rabble and Loyal says >> something that we all sorta know but the contending candidates aren't gonna >> bring up and i hear it and i say "yeah, right! Loyal's right!" maybe even >> he's a largely single-issue candidate, maybe not. but i want to send a >> message to city hall by voting for Loyal but the election between the real >> contenders might be close and my two-party contingency candidate may need my >> vote. so Loyal doesn't get it, because even if i agree with him and *want* >> to vote for him, i dare not. >> >> it's the typical Spoiler problem, that discourages voting for third-party >> or independent candidates. if they can never sufficient vote (because the >> race between credible candidates may be close) third parties cannot get off >> the ground and become contenders. but i was surprized that this guy who >> would directly benefit from a ranked ballot would be opposed to it. (he >> didn't like the Prog mayor and essentially jumped in the boat with the other >> Prog-haters that believed, falsely, that IRV specifically favored the Progs >> in Burlington.) >> >> that said, and to repeat that i also understand IRV to have *failed* in >> Burlington in 2009, i am not at all impressed with Range or Score voting for >> governmental elections (for certain Olympic sports, sure, but not for >> governmental elections). one of the complaints we have against both FPP and >> IRV (as we found out in Burlington in 2009) is placing obvious burdens of >> tactical voting on the electorate. we don't *like* having to forsake our >> favorite candidate in order to accomplish some other political imperative. >> FPP discourages the Nader voters from voting for their favorite candidate >> in 2000 by punishing them when it became clear that their vote cause Bush to >> be elected. and IRV discourages the GOP Prog-haters in Burlington from >> voting for their favorite candidate in 2009 when they discover that marking >> their favorite as #1 on the ballot actually caused the Prog to win. >> >> now, it's not the ranked ballot that failed these voters, it was the >> Hare-STV method of tabulating the vote. Condorcet would have taken the same >> ballot data and elected the candidate that was preferred by the electorate >> over any other specific candidate. The GOP who lost the most in the >> election would neither have gotten punished for their sincere 1st-choice >> vote (if IRV had survived, in 2012 these guys would be saying to themselves >> in the polls: "I gotta choose between Liberal and More-Liberal, because if I >> vote for the guy I really like, More-Liberal gets elected"), they would have >> been more satisfied with the Condorcet winner than with the IRV winner, who >> was their least favorite. And the Progs would have been more satisfied with >> the Condorcet winner than with the apparent FPP winner (the GOP), but they >> would be unhappy with the result due to rivalry the Progs and Dems have for >> the common liberal voter in this town. >> >> Ranked-choice voting requires less strategizing by the voter than Range >> because it requires less information. with a ranked ballot, all the voter >> needs to decide is who, in every contingency that matters to the voter, who >> he or she would vote for. they don't need to decide how much *more* they >> like Mother Teresa over Ghandi. If they really want to bury a third >> candidate, Stalin, they have to sacrifice their preference between the two >> virtuous and the election might be decided between them. Or maybe the >> election will turn out to be a battle between Stalin and Satan and they >> might rather live under Stalin than Satan, so they want to bump him up a >> little (leave Satan with a score of 0). but what if Satan wins because not >> enough voters scored Stalin up enough? or what if either Teresa or Ghandi >> lose to Stalin because too many voters scored Stalin too high (for fear of >> electing Satan)? >> >> what to do? what to do? >> >> but a ranked ballot is easy: >> >> Teresa > Ghandi > Stalin > Satan >> >> or, if you're more Hindu than Christian: >> >> Ghandi > Teresa > Stalin > Satan >> >> no tactical thinking necessary for the ranked ballot when it decided by >> Condorcet and a Condorcet winner exists. and, if a CW exists, the result is >> perfectly consistent, in every contingency, with the simple-majority, two >> candidate, one-person-one-vote election that everyone is familiar with. >> >> >> Does someone have thoughts on how to get your Range Voting plan voted >>>>> into action? I would like to hear how Range Voting moves beyond more than >>>>> just a good idea. >>>>> >>>> >> how does it move beyond "good idea" when it hasn't advanced to that >> square? (sorry Warren, i *really* have a lot of respect for you and your >> scholarship and your Burlington IRV page at your website, but you're still >> not convincing regarding Range. a little more convincing regarding >> Approval, but i would still not support that for political office, maybe the >> judiciary or some boards, but not executive nor legislative.) >> >> listen, everybody agrees with how a simple 2-candidate election should be >> decided: person with the most votes wins and every voters vote is of equal >> value. "simple majority" and "one-person-one-vote". >> >> wouldn't it make a lot more sense, since IRV is discredited, and FPP is >> clearly flawed, to put your energy into educating people about what goes >> wrong and *has* gone wrong in those elections and present an alternative >> with ballot no more complicated than with IRV and truer to the hypothetical >> 2-person race, whether the spoiler runs or not? >> >> >> I think we need to start a PAC or even maybe a party that has the sole >>>> objective of getting rid of plurality voting. >>>> >>> >> doesn't one exist? why not team up with FairVote? >> >> >> We need to be able to communicate that competitive elections in which >>>> there is no vote splitting is the most important thing we can do to hold >>>> politicians accountable. >>>> >>> >> sure, and how does Condorcet cause vote splitting? you don't need Range >> to address the problem of splitting the majority vote. >> >> >> We also need to be willing to vote for candidates who support getting >>>> rid of plurality regardless of what other positions that candidate holds. >>>> >>> oooh, i dunno if i can handle that. weirder things have happened than >> that of Michelle Bachmann supporting ranked-choice voting. i wouldn't vote >> for her even if she *loved* Condorcet. >> >> >> We need to communicate that once we get over this hump, we will no longer >>>> have to worry about having to vote for the lesser of two evils ever again. >>>> >>>> Another thing we can do is email and tweet news hosts like Rachael >>>> Maddow and ask them to do a segment on different voting systems. If we >>>> organize to tweet pundits at the same time, maybe they'll get the message. >>>> >>> >> dunno who Rachel Maddow is. guess i better google her. how about Chris >> Matthews? >> >> >> >> On 8/4/11 9:16 PM, Dave Ketchum wrote: >> >>> Here I talk of moving up from FPP to Range or Condorcet. I do not get >>> into other single-winner elections or into multi-winner elections - while >>> such deserve considering, they distract from my primary goal, which is to >>> promote moving upward without getting buried in details. >>> >>> Voters should see advantages in moving up to a better method. >>> >>> To vote for one, as in FPP: >>> . In Range, assign your choice a maximum rating. >>> . In Condorcet, simply rank your choice. >>> >>> which is simpler? >> >> >> Voting for two is using more power than FPP offers. Often there is a >>> major pair of candidates for which you prefer one, and one other that you >>> also want to vote for: For your second choice you could give the same rank >>> or rating, or lower: >>> . In Range you assign first choice maximum rating. Unrated share >>> minimum. The farther you rate second below max, the stronger your vote for >>> max over second. BUT, the nearer you rate second to unrated, the weaker you >>> rate second over unrated. >>> . In Condorcet, rank your first choice higher than your second. >>> >>> ditto. >> >> >> Voting for more is doable: >>> . In Range your difference in rating between any two is how much you >>> prefer the higher over the lower, and the sum of these differences decides >>> which wins their race. >>> . In Condorcet they count how many rank A>B vs how many rank B>A. >>> >> which meaning complies more with equal weighting of each voter's vote >> (what we normally mean by "one-person-one-vote")? >> >> >> Politicians may hesitate in moving up to more powerful methods. Range or >>> Condorcet can cost more, but getting a truer reading as to voter choices can >>> be worth the pain. >>> >> >> i'm sorry, guys. i'm really sorry, Warren, but between Condorcet and >> Range, it just ain't close. >> >> -- >> >> r b-j [email protected] >> >> "Imagination is more important than knowledge." > >
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