[EM] Mr Simmons: provide the FBC definition please

[Dave Ketchum]

On Tue, 4 Sep 2001 08:35:54 -0700 Craig Carey wrote, in part:
> 
> Lying again, are we?.
> 
> From:  Forest Simmons <fsimmons at p...>
> Date:  Sun Aug 26, 2001  11:14 am
> Subject:  Re: [EM] Three Tier, Dyadic via CR, etc.
> 
>  >
>  >We were launched on this particular search of elimination methods
>  >satisfying the Condorcet Criterion by a desire to fix IRV in a way that
>  >would be palatable to the same folks that now support IRV.
>  >
> 
> Perhaps the search will find nothing. Mr Simmons is giving an aim of
> finding something that does not exist. It would help here if Mr Simmons
> would comment on (1) monotonicity and (2) that property of STV that
> has the win-lose state of a given candidate, unaffected by changes
> after (and not including) its preference. Will (2) be lost and (1)
> worsened?. The word "fix" seems plain enough to me, but I presume that
> their it is, to the degree it is not undefined, an ideal of making IRV
> somehow worse.
> 
> 
> I presume that Mr Simmons can't produce a plot for the papers
> (AB), (B), (C), or for (AB), (A), (B), (C), that shows that there is
> any reason to imagine the pairwise comparing style ideas will be of
> use in improving IRV. It has been the history of this list to
> consider ideas that can't make it past the simplest 3 candidates tests.
> 
> Mr C. Layton's "Fluffy the Dog" example seems to pose a problem for
> people that could see Condorcet as plausible,

This caught my eye so, thanks to eGroups/Yahoo, I could and did go back
to this item in Nov. 00 archives:

I do NOT see this as an indictment of Condorcet.  These voters ALL SAID
they found Fluffy to be an acceptable candidate - and therefore have no
business complaining after they find they have elected Fluffy.  This
case could be offered to educate voters to a primary detail:
     Those who find A (or C) unacceptable can say this most strongly by
not voting for them, not even as third choice (even third choice labels
a candidate as acceptable).
     They likewise had no business voting for Fluffy unless they felt
they could at least tolerate succeeding in electing this candidate.
     By not listing a candidate the voter sends them to a shared common
basement below all that they do vote for.
     Aside from the basement thought, I do not like anything that
invites strategic voting.  For those who understand the strategy, it
gets in the way of ranking by perceived desirability; for those who do
not understand, they too often stumble into voting against their interests.

With better voting this election would have produced a tie - most any
scheme can result in a tie and therefore requires a definition as to how
to respond to such.

Case I like, and do not remember seeing here, is: 35 Bush, 33 Nader
Gore, 32 Gore:
     Plain IRV elects Bush, after deleting Gore for having least
first-place votes.
     Condorcet can see that voters like Gore more than Bush - most find
Bush unacceptable and most find Gore acceptable.
> 
> What about pairwise comparing's ability to properly implement vote
> bartering and perhaps bribing, in hierarchies of factions in elections
> with hundreds of candidates. 

I have ZERO sympathy for bribing, so will be happy if those get frustrated.

As to hundreds of candidates - how can any voter be expected to pick
intelligently among such a crowd, regardless of method of counting votes?
-- 
 davek at clarityconnect.com    http://www.clarityconnect.com/webpages3/davek
   Dave Ketchum     108 Halstead Ave, Owego, NY  13827-1708    607-687-5026
             Do to no one what you would not want done to you