[EM] James: Strategy definitions and criteria, 29 March, 0521 GMT

[MIKE OSSIPOFF]

You said:

"Burying" means one thing in the context of funereal
services.

I reply:

No, I didn't say that Blake uses "burying" differently from its usage in
funerals, or even that he uses it differently from its physical meaning. I 
said
that he uses it differently from the meaning that it always has, its general
meaning, without regard to any one particular context.

To bury something means to put it under something else, or to conceal it. 
That's
exactly the meaning of burying that I use when I refer to favorite-burial
strategy in Plurality or IRV.

If that isn't burying to Blake or to you, then you're using a different 
meaning
of burying, different from what the word means to others.

But I have no complaint if you or Blake invent new meanings for words.

You continue:

In the context of voting strategy, it has been given a
definition by Blake

I reply:

Yes, a meaning different from the accepted general meaning of the word.


You'd said:

>Your strategic analysis centers on what strategy voters should use to
>promote the election of the candidate whom they regard to be the sincere
>CW.
>
I replied:

>No, in regards to my criteria and strategy definitions, I'm not
>interested in what strategy voters should use. I'm interested in what
strategies
>they should need in order to protect the win of a CW, or to protect 
>majorilty
rule.

You say:

	That sounds like pretty much the same thing to me.

I reply:


Quite possibly it sounds to you like the same thing, but it isn't the same 
thing, and isn't even a similar thing.

What someone should do, and what someone should need to do are actually 
entirely
different things. I don't ask you to understand that, and I'm not going to
explain it to you. You can take my word for it.

I'd said:

>
>Excuse me, James. Give me a grounding in the basics :-)

	Read Blake's EMR page at Condorcet.org. I don't subscribe to all of his
definitions, and I don't agree with him on all controversial issues (e.g.
margins vs. wv), but I think that some of his terms (e.g. burying,
compromising, push-over, crowding) form a useful basis for understanding
strategic possibilities in different methods.

I reply:

Thank you for that grounding in the basics. :-) If Blake's website is the
basics, then I fully admit that I'm not grounded in the basics.

You say:

	"Normative" often stands in contrast to "positive". A positive judgement
is a judgement about how things are, while a normative judgement is a
judgement about how things should be... specifically what rules and
organizational systems should be used.

I reply:

But "should" needs context, and so your definition of "normative" isn't
complete.


Suppose that, by the actual vote count in 2004, combined with the number of 
Black Democrats who were denied their right to vote, Kerry won. That Kerry 
win was normative, in the context of the vote count and the intentions of 
people who tried to vote but were prevented from voting.

But suppose instead we're talking about what kind of a president we should 
have.

Suppose additionally that we shouldn't be sending Americans to die, and 
killing thousands of Iraqis, in order to complete the conquest of Iraq, and 
suppose that it would be better to have a president who, unlike Kerry, 
doesn't say that he wants to do that. Then, in that broader context, the 
election of Nader or someone like him was normative.

James, it's normative that you not use words that you can't define.

You continue:

In this context, I meant to say
that by incorporating the concept of the CW into your strategy criteria,...

I reply:

SFC and my Condorcet's Criterion mention the CW.

You continue:

...you are already assuming that Condorcet methods are normative, i.e. that
they should be used.

I happen to agree that they should be used, but I
think that basic strategy terms should be established independently from
this conclusion.

Your definitions are loaded. That is, obviously designed to support
methods that you have already decided to advocate.

I reply:

James, apparently things can be obvious to you without being true or even 
appearing to be true.

By your reasoning, then, if Condorcet wrote Condorcet's Criterion, then, 
since Condorcet's proposed methods meet Condorcet's Criterion, that means 
that Condorcet's Criterion is "loaded", because it was obvioulsly designed 
to support methods that Condorcet had already decided to advocate. You 
presumably believe that Condorcet said something like:

"I've previously decided [for unspecified reasons] that I want to advocate 
certain pairwise-count methods that will elect a candidate who 
pairwise-beats each of the others. How shall I promote those methods? Aha! 
I'll say that if a candidate pairwise-beats all of the others then he should 
win. I don't really believe that for a minute, but I'll say it if it will 
help promote the methods that I want to propose, the methods that elect a 
candidate who pairwise-beats all of the others, methods that I promote for 
some entirely different reason."

James, you're being ridiculous.

Yes, the methods that I advocate meet the criteria that I advocate. Guess 
what: That isn't a coincidence. There are two non-coincidence possibilities:

1. For some reasons that I've never admitted, I chose to advocate Condorcet 
and Approval, and then I cast about for a way to promote them, and decided 
to write criteria that they would meet.
and pretend that I want what the criteria require, and pretend that that is 
why I advocate wv and Approval.

2. I introduced wv, and have been advocating wv and Approval because of 
certain desirable properties that they have.  I wrote the defensive strategy 
criteria because they precisely describe those properties. I introduced wv, 
and have been advocating wv and Approval, and wrote the defensive strategy 
criteria because I've spoken with many lesser-of-2-evils voters who 
regularly bury their favorite in order to defeat some "greater-evil", and it 
isn't good for democracy when voters feel strategically forced to bury their 
favorite, reverse their preferences, conceal what they want, and bury their 
aspirations. There are circumstances under which it's possible to make 
guarantees about minimizing that need for such preference-concealing or 
preference-reversing strategy, and so I wrote criteria about that.

You, James, have determined, by ESP, that #1, above, is the correct 
explanation. Or, if it wasn't by ESP, perhaps you'd like to tell us how you 
made that determination.

You continue:

When you had your
"technical evaluation of election methods" page on electionmethods.org,
you made no mention of the fact that IRV passes
later-no-help/later-no-harm

I reply:

Even if later-no-help/later-no-harm had been written at the time that that 
webpage was written, I'm not interested in later-no-harm/later-no-help. 
Apparently you'd have me evaluate the methods by criteria that don't 
interest me. That would mean posting the methods' compliances and 
noncompliances by very many criteria,  wouldn't it. Because of space 
limitations and time limitations, I only suggested evaluating the methods by 
criteria that mean something to me. In fact, even among those that mean 
something to me, it was necessary to choose the ones that mean the most to 
me.

Sorry if that bothers you. It wasn't intended as a criteria survey article.

You continue:

...and is therefore immune to the burying
strategy, because you had already decided that you didn't want to promote
IRV.

I've repeated this very many times, including a few times during the last 
few days, but apparently it's necessary to repeat it again for you:

Your emphasis on methods' immunity to strategy is barking up the wrong tree. 
Plruality is immune to what you call burying strategy. So what? The reason 
why Plurality is widely recognized as the worst is because, though it is 
immune to what you call burying strategy, Plurality, given the situation 
that millions of voters believe exists, strategically forces voters to bury 
their favorite.

The problem is voters' need to reverse preferences or abandon or bury their 
favorite. That's why Plurality is widely recognized to have an especially 
serious strategy problem even though Plurality is immune to what you call 
buring strategy.

I'm not interested in immunity to what you call burying strategy. I'm not 
interested in methods susceptibility or immunity to strategy. I'm interested 
in the extent to which they strategically force voters to abandon their 
favorite and conceal what they really want.

I find that it's necessary to repeat the same things so often that I should 
just write these answers into a FAQ, and post the FAQ every time you or 
someone like you repeats the same questions and mis-statements.

I'd said:

>I don't claim to be able to tell you what compromising-compression means,


	That's too bad, since I gave you the date of the posting where I defined
it. That's 3/29/04. But anyway, here's the direct link:
http://lists.electorama.com/pipermail/election-methods-electorama.com/2004-March/012515.html
	In that post (one year ago tomorrow) I discussed the difference between
your criteria and Blake's criteria in some depth. Hence, it's closely
related to our current discussion, and I request that you read it.

I reply:

I'll check it out, but does it really say anything different from what 
you've been saying lately?

You know, to discuss the difference between my criteria and Blakes, I'd have 
to be conversant abouit Blake's criteria. I can't say that I am. But I can 
mention at least one difference: Blake's Condorcet Criterion and some of his 
others explicitly limit their applicability to rank methods. My criteria 
have universal applicability. That's one difference between Blake's criteria 
and mine.

Then there's the fact that my criteria were written because of the concerns 
that I expressed earlier in this reply. That, too, makes my criteria 
different from Blakes, though you might not like that.

I'd said:

>From your point of view, I don't doubt that that is so, but you haven't told
why it's so in a more general sense.

You say:

	I was exposed to your definitions before Blake's definitions. Your
definitions left me quite confused about strategic possibilities in
different methods.

I can't really speak to the issue of what you understand or what confuses 
you.

You continued:

When I expressed some of my confusion, Markus told me
Blake's terms, and I feel that it cleared up a lot. Especially Blake's
list of which methods are vulnerable to which strategies.

I reply:

I've told you why vulnerability to strategy doesn't interest me, and why 
you're barking up the wrong tree.

You continue:

	I've told you that Blake's definitions are less loaded than yours.

I reply:

Indeed you have. You've said that my criteria are "loaded" meaning that 
they're obviously designed to support methods that I'd already decided to 
advocate. And then I told you that you're being ridiculous.

You continue:

Hence
they are a more acceptable starting point for people who aren't
necessarily convinced that all voting methods should be judged against the
standard of Condorcet (wv) and approval voting.

I reply:

I've never justified my criteria in terms of Condorcet wv or Approval, or 
the standard of Condorcet wv or Approval voting.

You continue:

His definitions are also
simpler than yours. Again, this doesn't make yours invalid.

I reply:

You're too generous :-)

You continue:

It just makes
me feel that his concepts are a more reasonable starting point

I reply:

What's reasonable, for criteria, depends on what you want from a voting 
system.

You continue:

while your
concepts are better for later study, built on the previously-established
foundations.

I reply:

So you're suggesting that my criteria are built on a foundation previously 
established by Blake.
For one thing, my criteria preceded his. For another thing, the stated 
justifications of my criteria, and the wording of my criteria and their 
supporting definitions aren't based in any way on Blake's criteria. But if 
you can tell me of one of my criteria or supporting defintiions that is 
based on Blake's criteria, don't hesitate to do so.

Mike Ossipoff

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