On Wed, Apr 3, 2013 at 12:07 AM, Kristofer Munsterhjelm < km_el...@lavabit.com> wrote:
> On 04/03/2013 12:01 AM, Forest Simmons wrote: > >> Jobst has suggested that ballots be used to elicit voter's "consensus >> thresholds" for the various candidates. >> >> If your consensus threshold for candidate X is 80 percent, that means >> that you would be willing to support candidate X if more than 80 percent >> of the other voters were also willing to support candidate X, but would >> forbid your vote from counting towards the election of X if the total >> support for X would end up short of 80 percent. >> >> The higher the threshold that you give to X the more reluctant you are >> to join in a consensus, but as long as your threshold t for X is less >> than than 100 percent, a sufficiently large consensus (i.e. larger than >> t percent) would garner your support, as long as it it is the largest >> consensus that qualifies for your support. >> >> A threshold of zero signifies that you are willing to support X no >> matter how small the consensus, as long as no larger consensus qualifies >> for your support. >> >> I suggest that we use score ballots on a scale of 0 to 100 with the >> convention that the score and the threshold for a candidate are related >> by s+t=100. >> >> So given the score ballots, here's how the method is counted: >> >> For each candidate X let p(X) be the largest number p between 0 and 100 >> such that p(X) ballots award a score strictly greater than 100-p to >> candidate X. >> >> The candidate X with the largest value of p(X) wins the election. >> > > I think a similar method has been suggested before. I don't remember what > it was called, but it had a very distinct name. > > It went: for each candidate x, let f(x) be the highest number so that at > least f(x)% rate the candidate above f(x). > > I *think* it went like that, at least. Sorry that I don't remember the > details! Good memory, that was Andy Jennings' Chiastic method. Graphically these two methods are based on different diagonals of the same rectangle. > > > If there are two or more candidates that share this maximum value of p, >> then choose from the tied set the candidate ranked the highest in the >> following order: >> >> Candidate X precedes candidate Y if X is scored above zero on more >> ballots than Y. If this doesn't break the tie, then X precedes Y if X >> is scored above one on more ballots than Y. If that still doesn't break >> the tie, then X precedes Y if X is scored above two on more ballots than >> Y, etc. >> >> In the unlikely event that the tie isn't broken before you get to 100, >> choose the winner from the remaining tied candidates by random ballot. >> > > I imagine Random Pair would also work. > > > The psychological value of this method is that it appeals to our natural >> community spirit which includes a willingness to go along with the group >> consensus when the consensus is strong enough, as long as there is no >> hope for a better consensus, and as long as it isn't a candidate that we >> would rate at zero. >> > > That's an interesting point. I don't think that factor has been considered > much in mechanism design in general. Condorcet, say, is usually advocated > on the basis that it provides good results and resists enough strategy, and > then one adds the reasoning "it looks like a tournament, so should be > familiar" afterwards. > > Perhaps there's some value in making methods that appeal to the right > sentiment, even if one has to trade off "objective" qualities (like BR, > strategy resistance or criterion compliance) to get there. The trouble is > that we can't quantify this, nor how much of sentiment-appeal makes up for > deficiencies elsewhere, at least not without performing costly experiments. > If I am not mistaken, both methods (Chiastic and this one) are strategically equivalent to Approval from a game theoretic point of view. But psychologically they are quite different. I think that this new version is much less likely to elicit approval style responses (at the extremes) than ordinary Range voting for example, or even the median method with J in the title (I can't think of it at the moment).
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