[EM] [CES #3388] SODA strategy

[Jameson Quinn]

Here's what Charles Dodgson (Lewis Carroll) had to say about people who
denied the possibility of strategically-induced Condorcet cycles:

I am quite prepared to be told, with regard to the cases I have here
proposed, as I have already been told with regard to others, "Oh, that is an
extreme case, it would never really happen!" Now I have observed that the
answer is always given instantly, with perfect confidence, and without
examination of the details of the proposed case. It must therefore rest on
some general principle: the mental process being probably something like
this — 'I have formed a theory. This case contradicts my theory. Therefore
this is an extreme case, and would never occur in practice'.

Dodgson is right that it's easy to fall prey to confirmation bias in these
matters. I've done it myself, and I've certainly seen others do it. For
instance, the FairVote anti-range-voting "report" that they recently posted
on the false-flag website rangevoting.com spends several
unintentionally-funny paragraphs drawing the distinction between
merely-theoretical problems with voting systems and serious practical
problems. The joke is of course that the best (in fact the perfect) way to
know which category FairVote will class a given flaw into, is to see whether
the flaw affects IRV.

In order to avoid catching yourself in that kind of twisted logic, you have
to be willing to face reality, whatever it tells you. So, to respond to
Warren:
2011/8/9 Warren Smith <warren.wds at gmail.com>
>
> Well... good question.  I don't know the answer.   Perhaps the answer
> is some computer simulation study, but that isn't so easy nor will it
> necessarily be so clear (people will
> complain: "why didn't your study include voting method X?").
>
>
Can you expand on how you'd design that study? The fact that it won't
satisfy everybody, isn't a reason for me not to want to do it. My primary
reason to want to do this is to honestly test my ideas, not just to create
propaganda with foregone conclusions.

JQ
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