This is part 1 of a 2-part reply:
On Mon, Sep 24, 2012 at 4:11 PM, Juho Laatu <[email protected]> wrote: > I will not comment the Dodgson and changing vs. adding votes related misunderstandings. It is solved. The misunderstanding had nothing to do with changing vs adding votes. The misunderstanding was about the ambiguity of "any". Dodgson looks at the _sum_ of the margins against you, to find out how many pairwise votes would have to be reversed, ignored, or added (take your pick) to make you the CW. MinMax(margins), instead, looks at the single largest margin against you. As I said, it depends on how "any" is meant. Now I realize that you meant MinMax(margins). The only part that I missed was regarding its advantage(s). I spoke of its disadvantages, and about the natural authority of SITC's choice, when no there isn't exactly one unbeaten candidate.. Someone else might like the idea of MinMax(margins)' circular tie solution. Probably lower in social utility though. Most would probably agree that there's no such thing as one single best sincere winner, when ranking is sincere and there's a circular tie or no CW. It's an arbitrary matter of individual preference, unless someone argues in terms of SU. Even then, it would be difficult to prove that one particular circular tie solution is the best. In any case, though, MinMax(margins), as i said, uses an illegitimate definition of "CW". I hope that misunderstanding is now solved. My example best sincere winner criterion was meant to refer to the Minmax(margins) philosophy. > > On 24.9.2012, at 16.33, Michael Ossipoff wrote: > >> If you think that >> MinMax(margins) or Dodgson is better than Symmetrical ICT, under >> sincere voting, you have yet to tell why. >> Do you really think that would help hir >> status against opposition in office better than being the most >> favorite candidate in the top cycle? > > I don't know what "most favorite" means here. Then I'll tell you. By "most favorite", I meant voted favorite, voted in 1st place, by the most people. The usual meaning of "the most favorite" is "favorite to the most people". You said: Minmax(margins) can elect outside the top cycle if such a candidate is closest to being a CW (measured in number of required additional votes) [endquote] Now, you see, that's exactly what I was talking about. Now you're back to Dodgson again, aren't you. "Closest to being CW" is Dodgson. "Closest to being CW" is not MinMax(margins). "Closest to being CW" is about the _sum_ of the margins against you, rather than about the largest margin against you. But it doesn't make any difference whether you really mean Dodgson or MinMax(margins), because what I've said about one applies to the other too. You said: I don't claim that this criterion would be the best one for all elections, but it is one that sounds usable for some needs. [endquote] Pretty much anything is _usable_, at least for some needs. That hardly makes for an argument for Dodgson or MinMax(margins) vs SITC. If that's your most favorable and strongly-worded recommendation of an alternative to SITC, then there has indeed been a misunderstanding, because i thought that you were saying that a different method would do better under sincere voting. What you're saying seems to merely be that, because SITC is strategically good, then something else must be better when voting is sincere. I've twice told you why that isn't necessarily so. It's a fallacious way to try to show that SITC isn't good when voting is sincere. What you have is a "maybe". >> So you're saying that different voting systems should be used for >> different elections. But, as each new election comes near, who decides >> which method will be used for that particular election? > > I'd expect one series of elections to stick to one method (and be based on one stable understanding on what kind of a candidate is the best sincere winner). > >> Should we use different voting systems for presidential and >> Congressional elections? If so, then which one would be better (by >> ideal sincere winner) for the presidency,and which would be better for >> Congress? > You said: > Those two elections are very different by nature, and therefore they could > well have different targets / understanding of whom to elect with sincere > votes. The question on which method and which sincere winner criterion to > choose is very difficult since changes to the current system may mean changes > to the very basic concepts of the system. There are multiple options. One > interesting question is if the president should be from a large party of if > he/she could be a compromise candidate that has no major party behind him/her. [endquote] Best to let the voters decide that. If they want a large party, then give they will choose a large party. If they prefer smallness as a party-attribute, then they will choose a small party. But, guess what? What if they don't evaluate parties based on how large or small they are? Could it be that maybe they'd instead evaluate parties with regard to honesty, un-corruptness, and the desirability of the parties' policy proposals? But, in any case, it isn't for your or me to decide whether the winner's party should be small or large. Maybe voters will compromise, maybe not. Again, that's their choice. People will compromise to get their best outcome, but hopefully they have good judgement about what is unacceptable to them. I recommend that, if someone is progressive who prefers a progressive other than Jill Stein, for November, they should vote for Stein as a compromise. As a favorite-burial compromise. U.S. voters are hardly strangers to favorite-burial. Of course rank methods compromise automatically. But they all nevertheless require additional compromise on the part of the voter, for optimal strategy. You'd like to believe that in most societies, rankings will be sincere. I'm going to make a general statement about most societies: People like to get the best outcome possible. In the U.S., in England, and in Australia (with IRV), it's common knowledge that lots of people say that they favorite-bury, because it's optimal strategy. And you know what? They're right. It is. I myself would favorite-bury in an IRV election. In November, if the election were IRV, I'd rank Stein in 1st place, and Roseanne Barr in 2nd place, though I prefer Barr to Stein. l don't disagree with the use of favorite-burial in Plurality and IRV (or in unimproved Condorcet). I merely disagree with some other progressives' notion of what "acceptable" means. One nice thing about FBC methods is that the consequence of misjudgement about that aren't so bad. Both sides of the "Democrats acceptable?" question would agree on that. Everyone would agree on that, except of course the mass media. Maybe you think that my evaluation of candidate and party-platform acceptability is wrong. Maybe I claim that your evaluation of it is wrong. But we both agree that we don't want the other's acceptability-evaluation to have really bad consequences. So we both would like the other to not have to drastically distort due to those mistaken acceptability-evaluations. As I said, the owners of the mass media here are very strongly motivated to get people to favorite-bury. They're quite consistent, continual, tireless and relentless about it. I've describe the virtual news blackout regarding non-Republocrat candidates, parties and policies. In the U.S., it's as if they don't exist, because the media say so. Combine that with people's natural inclination (based on observations and personal reports in widely-separated countries) to vote to get the best result that they can. What does that say about your sincere ranking ideal? La La Land. If you think that most societies would rank sincerely, under these conditions that I've described above, then you're living in La La Land. But you needn't worry about the choice between large and small parties, or between compromise and favorite--that's for the voters to decide for themselves. I agree that sincere voting is good. That's why I like voting systems that don't drastically distort voter sincerity. The societal damage resulting from favorite-burial is drastically, dramatically, worse than any adverse result of not using a method that would choose the best ideal sincere winner, if voting were sincere. ..quite aside from the fact that I've told you why SITC does well when people rank sincerely. ...quite aside from that fact that you don't even really make a serious claim that your MinMax(margins) or Dodgson would do better. You only have a _speculation_ that maybe... ...quite aside from the fact that I've told you where people would rank as sincerely as you expect: La La land. You said: In the Congress one has to decide e.g. if one wants to keep the two-party approach or not. The end result might be two very different election methods. You see, you're still talking like a Soviet-system-advocate. It's entirely antidemocratic to purposely choose a voting system that will elect a number of parties chosen by you. It's blatantly obvious that Plurality preserves a (phony) 2-party system that is really a 1-party system. Your question is, "Gee, I don't know--Should we use a method that forces preference-distortion that will preserve a '2' party system?" Wrong question. With Approval, Score, or SITC, the voters will decide that for themselves. If they like the Republocrats best, then they'll keep on electing them, no matter how good the voting system is. They'll do so even with Approval, Score, or SITC. Don't worry. Those methods won't make a multiparty system if people really prefer the Republocrats. Stop worrying. >> Of course, judging by how well they choose the ideal sincere winner >> assumes that you still think that there won't be a chicken dilemma, >> and can tell why. > > I see the sincere winner criterion and strategic concerns as two separate topics. What is the sincere winner criterion? The methods that I advocate are the most likely to encourage sincere voting, or relatively sincere voting, in comparison with other methods. And that _is_ a strategic topic. That's because certain strategy-needs are what can and does distort sincere voting--the only thing that can distort and prevent sincere voting. You said: The method that will be eventually used may deviate from what the sincere winner criterion points to if there are strategic concerns that must be addressed by selecting a method that has the required strategy related properties. [endquote] You're repeating your speculation. I refer you to my explanation that the respect for voters' preferences, intents and wishes that makes SITC choose better under sincere voting, also results in less strategy need. You think that strategy-freeness and good sincere results are mutually incompatible. That's an unsupported speculation of yours. You've been repeating a speculation. >> If there will be defection in situations like the chicken >> dilemma examples, then can you still advocate Beatpath, >> MinMax(margins) or Dodgson over SITC, by saying they will get sincere >> rankings? > > You have to pick the method so that strategic concerns will be properly > addressed. I don't want to take position if one of those is >absolutely > better than others (since that is not relevant to my claim). I don't know what that means. > >>> I tried to cover all the questions in your mail. You may point out the unanswered ones, so I can check what I can do with them. > > I don't think the following four questions that you gave as a response are ones that I left unanswered, but new questions or new formulations. I'l check them anyway. > >> 1. What makes you think that MinMax(margins), Dodgson, or Beatpath >> won't have a chicken dilemma? > > I already said that I do believe that basic Condorcet methods are not very prone to this problem. I know that you disagree. Maybe you'll find one day a proof that will convince me. I'm going to repeat this all over again for you: The A and B voters detest C. They consider both A and B to be much better than C. But the A voters like A better than B. And the B voters like B better than A. Each of those factions (A and B) would rather elect their own candidate. Sincere rankings: Numbers at left represent percent of voters: 27: A>B>>C 24: B>A>>C 49: C (no preference between A and B, for simplicity) The A voters know that co-operation is needed to defeat C. So they co-operate, because someone must. The B voters know that the A voters are co-operative and responsible, and will surely co-operate by ranking B in 2nd place. So they choose to take advantage of the A voters by not ranking A. Actual rankings: 27: A>B 24: B 49: C The B voters have allowed C to pairbeat A. C beats A, 49 to 27. A beats B, 27 to 24. B beats C, 51 to 49. It's a circular tie. With 3 candidates, the unimproved Condorcet(wv) versions are the same as eachother. The smallest votes-against is the one against B. B wins. Evidently with margins, the defection-success isn't as guaranteed. But no doubt we can adjust the margins to make MinMax(margins) elect whomever the example-writer wants it to elect. Next time, I'll post for you an example in which MinMax(margins) and Dodgson fail too (they're the same in a 3-candidate circular tie). >> Must I do that, to show you their >> chicken dilemma? Request it and I will. > > No need since I don't expect that to change my opinions. It could be a wasted effort. I'm interested if there is something really convincing, but maybe better leave this topic this time, with the assumption that I would not believe it anyway. > >> 2. What makes you so sure that the United States won't have a >> significant amount of favorite-burial, when unimproved Condorcet, such >> as Dodgson, MinMax(margins) or Beatpath, is used? > > I'm not "sure" but my best guess is that basic Condorcet methods would work well enough. Repetition of that isn't the same thing as support for it. You said: My confidence is based on theoretical studies, experiences with Condorcet in non-political elections and experiences with IRV in political elections [endquote] You mean like in Australia, where people say that they're favorite-burying? And when Australians say that favorite-burial is optimal in IRV, they're right. It's optimal. I'd favorite bury in an IRV election. To be continued... Mike Ossipoff ---- Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
