[EM] Center for Range Voting Formed

[Warren Smith]

>Robla: However, the Condorcet winner criterion is quite easily and
unambiguously applied to Range Voting ballots, since a ranked ballot can
be easily derived from a Range Voting ballot.

--that isn't fair because a range voting ballot cannot be derived from
a ranked ballot.  This is a one-way noninvertible transformation.

--as I described last post, the Condorcet winner criterion is quite easily seen
NOT to be unambiguously applicable to Range Voting ballots, and you have to make
a choice of definition.

>robla: In fact, the Condorcet winner criterion has nothing to do with the
ballots, and everything to do with the electorate.  You only need to
answer the question "if head-to-head elections are conducted among all
of the candidates, is there a candidate that wins every election they
are part of?"  Given that its possible to derive the electorate's intent
from a set of Range Voting ballots, it's hard to argue that there's
ambiguity there.

--here you are missing the subtlety I discussed last post in the "ASIDE"
portion.  If this is your point of view then you have to accept the fact that,
USING A RANKED BALLOT VOTING METHOD, if the electorate voted in some way in
a N-candidate election which (with all but candidts A,B ignored) seemed
to be saying  A beats B,  then that same electorate, voting
again but now only on A&B, might in fact produce votes that say B beats A.
(Because the A>B conclusion of the first election might have been an artifact of
voter strategy - that strategy changing in the re-vote with only 2 involved.)
So your whole viewpoint "everything to do with the electorate" is in fact, just
a delusion.  There are two ways you can try to wriggle out of that trap.
You can either tell your electorate "I, Rob L. demand that in the re-vote,
you STAY with the same votes, dammit, no strategy changing allowed"
in which case, range voting is a condorcet method.  Or you can tell them
"I, Rob L. demand that in the re-vote, you MUST be strategic but MUST
have been honest in the first vote" in which case range is not a condorcet method.


Time to admit I'm right :)