[EM] Markus, 20 March, 0440 GMT

[Markus Schulze]

Dear Mike,

I wrote (19 March 2005):
> Well, the term "MinMax" is less ambiguous than
> your term "Plain Condorcet", since this method has
> absolutely no resemblance to Condorcet's proposals.
> Actually I prefer the term "Simpson-Kramer".

You wrote (20 March 2005):
> Now you want to give me complete credit for the
> initial proposal of PC.

Nope. You haven't invented MinMax. MinMax has already
been proposed e.g. by Simpson and Kramer (That's why the
MinMax method is frequently called "Simpson-Kramer".)
and discussed e.g. by Young and Fishburn. You only
mistakenly believe that Condorcet proposed MinMax.

*********

You wrote (20 March 2005):
> I should point out that one of Condorcet's proposals,
> for when no one is unbeaten, was the repeated  dropping
> of the weakest pairwise-defeat. In other words: PC.
> I'm not going to encourage you to waste everyone's
> time with another debate about what Condorcet proposed.

It is interesting that you insist that Condorcet
proposed MinMax and simultaneously you say that
you don't want to discuss what Condorcet really
proposed.

*********

I wrote (19 March 2005):
> I can only comment on how you motivated wv at the EM
> mailing list. Here, you used GMC from the very beginning.
> And GMC was one of your main arguments for using wv.

You wrote (20 March 2005):
> I introduced and proposed wv in 1994. I defined GMC,
> first mentioned GMC, in 1996 or 1997.

Well, the EM mailing list has been created in 1996.
Therefore, it is not possible that you introduced
and proposed wv in 1994 to this mailing list.

*********

You wrote (20 March 2005):
> My justification of my introduction and advocacy of
> wv was based on completely general arguments ...

... like the "Generalized Majority Criterion" (GMC).

However, in your 19 March 2005 mail you wrote: "At the time
when I introduced wv, there were only 2 methods known on EM
that could use wv or margins: PC and Smith//PC." So when
you use the term "completely general arguments" then you
are actually only talking about MinMax and Smith//MinMax.

*********

You wrote (20 March 2005):
> Which Condorcet versions had been proposed on EM at
> the time when I introduced wv is quite irrelevant to
> the matter. I justified wv by general considerations
> not limited to a particular method.

Nope. Your GMC is satisfied by no other wv tie-breaking
strategy than the MinMax(wv) tie-breaking strategy. The
fact that you don't use GMC anymore doesn't change the
fact that you used GMC when you proposed and motivated
wv at this mailing list and that GMC was one of your
main arguments for wv.

Markus Schulze