[EM] Andrew: Sincere methodsd

[MIKE OSSIPOFF]

Andrew--

You said:

I would think that if votes are sincere, the best voting method would not be
Condorcet at all. It would be for each voter to assign a number of points to
each candidate representing the utility they ascribe to that candidate. The
candidate with the largest total utility would win. This method has obvious
advantages over Condorcet: it is simpler and takes advantage of more
information from the voters.

I reply:

That's CR. If voters have no wish to maximize their own utility expectation, 
and only want to rate truly in order to maximize social utility, then CR is 
what maximizes social utility.

But that doesn't mean that those conditions are the only ones in which CR is 
an excellent method.

You continue:

Of course, it is trivially vulnerable to insincere
voters.

I reply:

CR is the only method for which it has been demonstrated that nothing, not 
even insincere voters, can give you a reason to vote someone over your 
favorite. (Of course Approval is a CR version).

As I was saying before, this emphasis on vulnerability to strategy 
completely misses the point, and the boat.

Is IRV very vulnerable to insincere strategy? Is Plurality vulnerable to 
insincere strategy? Is that the problem of IRV and Plurality, their 
vulnerability to insincere strategy?

What's wrong with Plurality & IRV is that, even without any offensives 
insincere strategy to be vulnerable to, they often strategically force 
voters to bury their favorite, reverse their preferences, and conceal what 
they want. As I said, that isn't good for democracy.

That's why I suggest that the emphasis should, instead, be on minimizing the 
need for drastic defensive strategy. Minimize the extent to which voters 
need to violate their own wishes in order to protect majority rule or to 
protect the win of a CW.

CR has been shown to meet FBC and WDSC. That makes CR a big improvement over 
Plurality and IRV. Let's not ask for so much that we ask people to enact 
something that is less winnable.

The trouble with rank methods is that there are innumerable ways to count 
rankings. It's necessary to show people that the rank-count that you propose 
is the best one. That could take a long time, especially when the IRVists 
are heavily promoting their meritless rank-count, and other proposals will 
be heard too. There's only one obvious and natural way to count CR: Add up 
each candidate's points.

Another problem with rank methods is that, even with the best rank methods 
in place, voters will still feel a strategic need to rank Compromise over 
Favorite, if they don't understand the count rule. I've spoken to people 
said that either they or someone else wouldn't want to rank Nader over 
Kerry, for fear of not giving Kerry enough support against Bush. Would they 
be willing to rank Nader equal to Kerry? Depends on how well they understand 
the count rule. But if that's the best that they'll do, then why not just 
propose CR instead?

Mike Ossipoff

_________________________________________________________________
Don’t just search. Find. Check out the new MSN Search! 
http://search.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200636ave/direct/01/