[EM] Re: Markus, criteria

[Russ Paielli]

Kevin Venzke stepjak-at-yahoo.fr |EMlist| wrote:

> It seems to me that Mike's criteria aren't ambiguous, but it can be hard to decide
> for certain whether methods satisfy them.

> FBC:
> 
>>By voting a less-liked candidate over his/her favorite, a voter should never gain 
>>an outcome that he/she likes better than every outcome that he/she could get 
>>without voting a less-liked candidate over his/her favorite.
> 
> 
> I think this is clear, but hard to use. Suppose if I vote B>A>C>D>E, when A is my
> sincere favorite (that is, I like candidates who come earlier alphabetically), then 
> B is elected. Suppose we try 20 other ways of voting, all with A at the top or
> equal top, and these all elect E. I want to conclude that this is an FBC failure.
> I can't, though, because it might be the case that e.g. A=E>B=D>C will elect A.

FBC is a great example of a Mike-style criterion that does nothing but 
complicate the idea it attempts to express. Why did Mike create this 
"criterion"? Probably because he didn't understand that other election 
method criteria are based on cast and tally rules votes only.

And what does FBC mean in standard English? It means that Approval never 
gives any voter any incentive to not approve his favorite candidate, 
whereas plurality, IRV and other methods do. Thanks for that brilliant 
insight, Mike.

But wait ... isn't voting another candidate *equal* to your favorite a 
kind of "betrayal" too? If I told my wife that she has equal standing 
with some other woman, I'll bet she'd feel "betrayed"! Which just goes 
to show that Mike's "criteria" can be misleading.