[EM] Richard reply, 5/7/12

[Michael Ossipoff]

Now I'm going to reply to Richard's latest.

I do so because I take seriously anyone's responsibility to reply to questions
and objections. That, as I said, is a difference between Richard and me.

But first a few more general comments on the topic and the discussion:

We often hear about how Condorcet, but not Approval, lets you help
Favorite against
Compromise.

Yeah? How about this, then?:

27: A>B (they prefer A to B, and B to C)
24: B>A
49: C  (indifferent between everyone other than C)


A and B are a mutual majority, who, together, by co-operating, could
defeat C. ...if
they both rank eachother's candidates 2nd.

If they do, then A wins. But maybe the B voters want B to in instead.
If they refuse to
rank B, then they can take advantage of the oo-operativeness sof the A
voters, and make
B win instead of A.

That's the co-operation/defection problem, also known as the chicken-dilemma.

Condorcetists (among whom I include the few Kemeny advocates, and the
one advocate of a
quasi-Kemeny that he calls "Vote-Fair") are in denial about that problem.

It means that the Condorcetists' proposals _don't_ have the advantage
over Approval that
they rely on so much in their arguments.

Now, a Condorcetist might say, "Yes, but if A and B voters all rank
eachother's candidate 2nd,
then the right winner will be chosen." Yes, but if the A and B
factions are so co-operative,
amicable, in agreeement and mutually-supportive, then how important is
it really, to do
your best to make Favorite beat Compromise?

Under those conditions, what's wrong with just giving approval to them
both, and letting the one
win who is most approved by other voters?

To just add some clarifying emphasis to something that I said, if I'd
ideally prefer ICT, does that
mean that I should regard Approval as a rival? That unproductive
approach isn't mine.

I've been claiming that Approval is the proposable and enactable
voting system reform. I've amply told why that is,
in my Approval article and in various postings, and Richard doesn't
like for me to repeat things.

So a Condocetist could say, "You're really just like us, claiming "My
method is the best public proposal."

Well, not quite. I say _why_ that's so.

You see, what it really comes down to is examination of people's
justifications for their claims. Look at
my justifications for my claim that Approval is the proposable and
enactable voting system reform. And look
at (for example) Richard's explanation (if he'd given one) for why
VoteFair is more proposable and enactable.
And decide for yourself.

Our task is either:

1. Work together to find, through honest open discussion, which method
is the one that a) we can work to enact, and b) is good enough.

OR

2. Propose our various separate pet favorites if we must, without
publicly attacking proposals
other than our own (unless we honestly believe that those other
proposals would be
disastrous and worse than Plurality), and let our audiences decide
among them for themselves.

In alternative #2, we can discuss, _among eachother_, at EM, the
relative merits of our proposals. But when
you do, you need to justify your statements, _be specific_, and answer
questions and criticisms of your statements.

Richard, you said that Approval has problems, and that it will be
controversial in hotly contested elections,
and that it will make people want to go back to Plurality. Do you want
to talk about it?

Again, it doesn't matter if Richard doesn't justify his claims. Just
so everyone knows that he can't support
them.

Again, I've written a lot without getting to Richard's text. I'll have
to again postpone my reply to Richard's
text.

Mike Ossipoff








Here is my reply to Richard's text:

Richard said:

[Here are my responses to Mike's comments about my "rebuttal."]

In a non-forum email message Adrian made a comment about Mike Ossipoff's
article, and I replied (as part of replying to other topics as well)
that I intended to post a message on the forum to refute a comment from
Mike about him learning something significant from voting experiments
done on the forum.  I didn't have time to write that intended message.
Recently when Adrian said he would be posting the article soon, he asked
if I wanted to write what he called "the" "rebuttal."

When I found and read the final version of Mike's article, Mike referred
to a mock "presidential" poll on this forum, but apparently that took
place before I became involved in this forum, so I was not in a position
to make a comment about that.

Yes, of course you/Mike are allowed to respond to my "rebuttal."
However, as is the norm for printed publications, you are not allowed to
split up my comments with your comments -- just as I did not intersperse
my "rebuttal" comments within your article.

Also, as is standard practice, you are not allowed to introduce new
topics in your response to a "rebuttal."  If you don't know what this
means, please read my "rebuttal" more carefully. (And if you still don't
know what I mean, notice that I did not mention any Condorcet method, I
only referred to the Condorcet criterion.)

Yes, I made a grammatical mistake when I used the word "criteria"
instead of "criterion" in the words "... Approval voting fails the more
highly regarded criterion called the Condorcet criteria".

You ask for evidence to support my claim that most election-method
experts do not regard the Favorite Betrayal Criterion as being as
important as the Condorcet criterion.  On the election-method forum my
observation is that far fewer participants have expressed support for
FBC compared to Condorcet compliance.  We could conduct a poll here on
the forum if you think I am mistaken.

In another message you refer to the idea of not mentioning other methods
such as Condorcet methods, but that's irrelevant because I referred to
the Condorcet criterion, not any Condorcet method.  If you are going to
promote a specific criterion (FBC) as highly important, then I or
someone else needs to balance that out by clarifying that the FBC
criterion is just one of many criteria, and that FBC is not highly
regarded by many election-method experts.

If you want to revise your article I won't mind, but of course then a
new or revised rebuttal will be written (either by me or someone else).

(And if you want to be credible in your response to a rebuttal, then you
need to respond with facts or clarifications that do not just repeat
what you already said in your article.)

And remember that we are on the same side of the fence (trying to oppose
the existing plurality method).

Richard Fobes
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