[ER] Minnesota and IRO (fwd)

[lemaun koonce]

unsubscribe me please
-----Original Message-----
From: Mike Ositoff <ntk at netcom.com>
To: election-methods-list at eskimo.com <election-methods-list at eskimo.com>
Date: Friday, November 06, 1998 8:16 PM
Subject: Re: [ER] Minnesota and IRO (fwd)


>Forwarded message:
>
>
>This is a reply to part of a message that was sent to ER & EM.
>I've just replied to the ER copy, but forgot to send a copy
>to EM. And so I'm now forwarding my reply to EM. That's why
>my reply has ">" characters at the beginning of each line,
>and the original message has 2 such characters at the beginning
>of each line.
>
>> > didn't get it.  In fact, one of the 2 big Twin Cities daily papers, in
>> > endorsing another candidate, described Alan's new method as "abstruse"
>>
>> And yet you claim that that method, rejected by those authors
>> because of its complexity, is more acceptable & easier to
>> understand than the other proposals here, including the
>> simple Approval method.
>>
>> > I know from tracking the EM discussion that some of you strongly
dislike
>> > Instant Runoff.  It may be theoretically inferior to other methods; I'm
>>
>> "Theoretically inferior", that's what CVD types like to say. No
>> it isn't just theoretically inferior. It will be inferior in
>> its results. Actual, not theoretical.
>>
>>
>> > not convinced, but I haven't been reading and studying EM closely.  But
>>
>> Then won't you study the subject? No time to? No problem, but
>> if you don't study it, then don't be so sure about the relative
>> merits of the methods.
>>
>> With few exceptions, the advocates of IRO tend to be people
>> who are too busy promoting whatever they're promoting to actually
>> take a serious responsible look at the merits issues of
>> single-winner methods.
>>
>> > I have to say that right now there's no way in the world to actually
>> > 'sell' any of the other methods that are being discussed and compared.
>>
>> Yeah? What was it that those newspaper authors said about IRO? :-)
>>
>> Approval is far simpler to define & explain than is IRO.
>> Where IRO involves considerable change, which you admit that
>> people don't like, and amounts to a completely new & different
>> voting system, Approval is nothing other than Plurality done
>> right, Plurality with the voter freedom that it should have
>> always had. And Approval, unlike IRO, won't give people a
>> strategic need to completely abandon their favorite. With Approval
>> everyone can always vote for their favorite.
>>
>> > Practically speaking, if it takes more than a minute to break through
to
>> > the potential voter, there's no way to grab their attention to explain
>> > Condorcet Winners or anything else.  Instant Runoff is what we have to
>> > use in the real world to introduce a change from plurality single
winner
>> > elections.  There has to be a bridge to a more perfect system.
>>
>> I recommend that you study the subject, and you'll find out that
>> IRO isn't any significant step in the direction of a better
>> system.
>>
>> Approval is defined without talking about Condorcet winners.
>>
>> So is Condorcet(EM):
>>
>> A beats B if more voters rank A over B than vice-versa.
>>
>> If a candidate beats each one of the others then he wins.
>>
>> OTherwise, the winner is the candidate whose greatest defeat
>> is the least, as measured by how many voters rank the defeating
>> candidate over him.
>>
>> ***
>>
>> (Though a candidate who beats each one of the others must be
>> a Condorcet winner, that term wasn't used).
>>
>> Mike Ossipoff
>>
>>
>