[EM] more inputs & more ballotings

[Dave Ketchum]

Thank you - this topic needs review occasionally.

On Mon, 25 Mar 2002 03:13:05 +0000 MIKE OSSIPOFF wrote:

> 
> 
> Maybe much improvement could be gotten by methods that use more
> than one balloting, especially more than 2 ballotings. Maybe
> idealness can be approached more if methods additionally use
> more than 1 kind of input.
> 
> How good could such methods get, in regards to the goal of
> reducing strategy incentive or strategy dilemma? Which method of that
> type seems the best in that regard?
> 
> For 1-balloting, nonprobabilistic methods, is there any method
> that can do better than Approval, CR, & Condorcet(wv) when judged
> by that standard?
> 
> It wouldn't surprise me if a multiballoting, multi-input method
> could do significantly better than the best 1-balloting methods.
> 
> Condorcet can be improved by holding a 2nd balloting under some
> conditions, but Condorcet(wv) is so good as-is that the acceptance
> value of just 1 balloting seems to outweigh the benefit of the
> 2nd balloting.
> 
> I suspect that's true also of the possibly super-better
> multiballoting, multi-input methods. Their added complexity would
> reduce their public acceptability, and the best simple methods are
> already so good that further improvement isn't worth the loss
> of public acceptability.
> 
> Of course those more complex but better methods would still be useful
> for organizations & committees that want the very best social choice
> methods. But, for me, the big value in organizations using better
> voting systems is that they could set precedent for those methods
> being adopted for public elections. With that goal, one would want
> to offer organizations methods that would be winnable as public
> proposals.
> 
> I'm not saying that the best 1-balloting rank-counts don't leave
> obvious room for improvement--I noticed that especially when I
> realized that even with the best of those, I'd vote as in
> Approval in our public elections, ranking all the acceptable
> candidates in 1st place.
> 
> Mike Ossipoff
> 
Agreed that the more complex methods are worth studying, and usable in 
whatever organizations find the effort required for understanding and 
using acceptable.
     
However, public elections have their own requirements:
     Multiballoting is unacceptable, unless it provides a MAJOR 
improvement in quality of results (which it seems not to:  It costs 
too much money; it costs more inconvenience to voters than many are 
willing to tolerate; results SHOULD be known election night 
(acceptable for near ties, ONLY, to be reported as such, and wait on 
absentee ballots for resolution)).
     Voters need to understand the rules for voting, so KISS.  My 
understanding is that ordering by preference is all there is with 
Condorcet.
     Possibility of profiting by strategy is bad news.  IRV offers 
this, and voters who do not quite understand the strategy can hurt 
themselves.

      Trying to be simple can be deceptive.  Approval is easy to count,
and sounds easy to vote until you have a ballot in your hands with a list 
of 4 lemons and need to decide how many of them you want to call "approved".
      Voters also need to understand the rules for counting, and to be 
able to see what their precinct, town, or county contributed toward even a 
statewide election.  Condorcet and Approval offer this.  I do not see how 
IRV can (there were 13 candidates for President in FL in 2000, 9 different 
candidates for governor in NY in 1998).
           Note:  Basic counting rules for Condorcet are understandable; 
more complex rules for resolving near-ties need not be, so long as there 
ARE rules.

A few notes:
      Mike seems to use "better" as approaching some ideal.  Not clear 
what that is, or whether I would agree with it being an ideal.
      Do not understand "CR", "multi-input", or "(wv)" - I cannot spend 
all my time here - some of my available time goes for promoting Condorcet.
      BTW - is Condorcet in use anywhere?  It should be.

-- 
  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.
                    If you want peace, work for justice.