[EM] Lomax continues to be confused about DH3 and range voting

[Abd ul-Rahman Lomax]

I find it rather odd that my alleged confusion becomes the subject here....

At 01:37 PM 10/24/2005, Warren Smith wrote:
>It is not possible for me to unconfuse somebody this massively confused.

I'm sure. But that is not your motive for writing here. Rather, you 
have different motives. If your motive were to "unconfuse" me, you 
would simply explain what is unclear.

>I will therefore only point out a few things.
>1. Lomax claims DH3 is a fantasy not seen in a real election & 
>demands I cite a historic
>example.

I don't think I made any demands, I simply pointed out the lack of such.

>   Perhaps that is because there has never been a real election held 
> using Condorcet
>methods.  Could that be it?

Yes, indeed, that could be it. Or it might not be. Given that there 
is no real experience, DH3 in Condorcet elections remains a 
theoretical construct. In other words, a fantasy. Fantasies can be 
true, it is not a perjorative term for me. But Warren tends to assume 
his fantasies are true. Perhaps my next post will have the subject 
"Smith once again imagines his fantasies are fundamental and proven truth."

>    There have been Borda elections in Kiribati, whose
>newspapers are unfortunately rather inaccessible to me,

Darn! But that won't stop Mr. Smith from proceeding to cite the 
nonexistent evidence.

>  but I did read a polysci paper
>documenting the DH3-like phenomenon that occurred in the very first 
>election they tried.

First of all, Borda. Second of all, second, the phenomenon was *not* 
DH3, but "DH3-like." In the absence of any specific information, it 
is quite difficult to tell what this means. How, for example, is it 
known that the "Dark Horse" got his or her votes because of insincere 
rankings by voters? Perhaps they are technologically advanced in 
Kiribati, and have recording mind-readers installed at the polls? 
Yes, it's possible that poll information could reveal such a 
situation, but what I'm pointing out is that it might, instead, 
simply have been the speculation of some writer somewhere. A rumor, 
and that is what we have from Mr. Smith, is hardly much improved from 
a fantasy.

>[...]


>2. Lomax then attempted to claim Range Voting also would suffer DH3.  He
>gave an "example" in which voters who favor A,B,C and not D, decide
>strategically to range-vote in the style A=10, B=C=0, D=4, causing D to win.
>Of course this was actually nonstrategic because D=0 was strategic.

Depends. I did not actually claim that the vote for D was strategic. 
I claimed that the vote for B and C were strategic, attempts to lower 
the rating of those candidates, and the vote for D was honest. *4 is 
a low rating.* It would help if Mr. Smith actually read what I wrote, 
instead of simply assuming that it is confused and wrong. The 
confusion he sees is a projection, largely.

>Lomax then "explains" this by saying D was not known by the voters to be worse
>than A,B,C (which was the DH3 scenario, he is therefore changing it); instead
>D was "unknown" and the D=4 was a voter-guess.  Well, then D winning 
>was not such a
>disaster, was it?

We don't know. D is a Dark Horse. Remember?

>   Disaster=worst one wins;   Not as bad=unknown wins.

But since D is unknown, D could, in fact, be the worse one. I was 
writing about the common tendency for people, partisans of one, to 
downgrade others below what their true rating would be in the absence 
of "strategy."

(To be more exact, I claimed that the votes for B and C were 
"sincere." But they were sincere within a habit of strategic 
*thinking* which is self-confirming. I favor A, so B and C must be 
nasty. And since B and C are so nasty, I *really* favor A, after all, 
look at the alternatives.)

>Voters would in fact only rate D=4 after A=10, B=C=0 if they thought 
>D was in fact
>likely to be superior to B,C; there is no reason to act otherwise.

Warren, you don't know human beings very well.

>Anyhow in practice my polls show that real human range voters rate 
>unknowns as 0 rather
>than as "unknown" by about a 1.7:1 ratio, so in fact, Lomax's example
>would not occur.  So his example both would not occur and if it did would
>not be an example.  I wish Lomax would think before blogging, rather 
>than the other way round.

Naw, why bother? Takes too much effort.

Mr. Smith has conducted *one* rather flawed poll. (Actually, it was a 
set of two different polls conducted simultaneously and compared.) He 
then extrapolates from the behavior of some voters in an artificial 
situation, *not* a polling booth, to the universe of human behavior. 
As I read what he wrote, *some* voters, in his situation, might *not* 
rate unknowns as 0. Indeed, in an election with a wide range of 
candidates, from excellent to truly awful, an 0.5 for unknowns would 
be quite rational, if not for one thing: that a candidate is unknown 
is a bad sign as to the readiness of that candidate for office. But 
one might disagree with that, quite reasonably.

>3. Lomax mutters about voters and Condorcet cycles and how he thought it
>unlikely the voters would act in a DH3 manner in view of the 
>unlikelihood of cycle breaking.
>There may be something to that, although I doubt it.

Especially since Lomax wrote it. But even a stopped clock is right 
twice a day, Warren, so be careful.

>However, I am afraid I consider it much more likely
>that if you ask a random real human voter "what is a Condorcet 
>cycle" they will not know.

Yes. So they won't vote for a strategy that depends on cycles.

>Given that, it seems to me unlikely that voter thinking will be 
>dominated by Lomax's
>thinking, and plausible that voters will simply act in a DH3 manner.

I'd say that if the thinking behind this is clear, the expression is confused.

>4. Finally, Lomax attacks my theorem about strategy in range voting
>by asking "but what if they [voters] exaggerate?"
>I  will simply allow the incredible stupidity of this "question"
>and Lomax's subsequent "argument" to speak for itself.
>The best I can imagine as an explanation is that Lomax has no idea 
>what the word "strategy"
>means in voting theory.  Again, I would suggest learning the word 
>before writing 10 pages of
>blogs about it, rather than after.
>
>At some point, one tires.

At some point, one goes to sleep and rests.