[EM] FBC + majority defensive strategy criteria--2nd generation best methods

MIKE OSSIPOFF nkklrp at hotmail.com
Mon May 23 13:10:55 PDT 2005


WV and its enhancements could be called 1st generation best methods. 
Approval combines FBC and WDSC, but when FBC is added to wv's better 
criteria, that counts as a new kind of merit, a 2nd generation of best 
methods.

It had never occurred to me that MMPO would meet FBC, because wv and margins 
don't meet FBC.  Maybe it's partly the fact that we're so used to hearing 
that the Condorcet Critrerion is important, that we just habitually accepted 
CC-complying methods even though that's causing them to fail FBC.

As you pointed out earlier, MMPO meets SFC. And, with AERLO, it meets SDSC 
too. In fact, with AERLO, methods that meet FBC meet Strong FBC--at least in 
regards to 1st choice ranking. As you said, that's the important aspect of 
FBC compliance.

So: FBC, SFC, and SDSC, all with one method.

These FBC-complying methods came along at just the right time, right after 
I'd found out for myself that some, many, or most progressive voters are 
going to feel a need for favorite-burial in rank methods. Australia's 
experience showed that too. They say that in Australia it isn't that people 
know IRV's failings, so much as that people are using Plurality strategy 
with IRV. But the fact remains that they often _will_ need that strategy 
with IRV. And you or someone showed that wv fails FBC. That means that it 
isn't possible to reassure people that there's never a need to bury their 
favorite.

And I'd just been expressing concern a day or two ago, about choosing 
between SDSC and FBC. Because SDSC could help if progressives will always be 
too timid to stop giving Approval votes or top CR ratings to the Democrat; 
but SDSC won't do any good if progressives can't keep from ranking Democrat 
over Nader because of lack of FBC compliance. But if it's possible to meet 
both of those criteria, that's the best of all.

With an FBC-complying method, like MMPO, that assurance could be given and 
emphasized:  "You can't possibly hurt SleazeDean's chances of winning by 
ranking Nader or Camejo equal to him" (Or "...by ranking Nader or Camejo 
over him and applying AERLO below him.")

You didn't name the 2nd method you defined yesterday. But it's more 
complicated than MMPO. AERLO could be added to MMPO in a subsequent public 
proposal, so that the 1st proposal could be plain MMPO.

If I refer to it here, I'll just call it the 2nd method. It's true that a 
majority who prefer X to Y can keep Y out of set S by just ranking X over Y, 
and Y over no one. But what if X is in a viscious majorilty cycle, added-to 
by voters other than the X>Y voters? Might S not be empty?  So that method's 
SDSC compliance could come at the cost of indecisiveness. I don't know. That 
could be incorrect. It's just my first impression.

Anyway, I like the simplicity of MMPO.

The 2nd generation of best methods has arrived.

Mike Ossipoff

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