[EM] ignoring "strength of opinion"

[rob brown]

On 12/6/05, James Gilmour <jgilmour at globalnet.co.uk> wrote:
>
> Rob, if there is any confusion it is in the original "maximises social
> utility" posts.  The words in those messages did
> NOT make it clear or even suggest that the ranges should be recorded on a
> fixed scale - quite the contrary.  That's what
> started this present discussion.  With a fixed scale, there is no issue.


Hmmm, I thought fixed scale was rather obvious, if not from the name
"range", but just from the absurdity of the idea of being able to give it
any weight whatsoever ("a million!" "infinity!"  "infinity times two!"
"infinity times infinity!"....)

I believe this discussion started after the acknowledgement from the range
voting people that range voting, even on a fixed scale, even if normalized,
gives people the choice as to how strongly to express their opinions for the
candidates that are neither their favorite nor least favorite.  Even worse,
it does so in a way that does not make it clear that they may be
compromising their own interests by "downweighting" their vote.

Voting anything other than 1 or 10 (or whatever the range is) is
downweighting.
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