[EM] Kristofer, April 3, '12, Approval vs Condorcet

[Michael Ossipoff]

> It's necessary to distinguish between _two_ Condorcet disadvantages 
> that I spoke of:
>
> 1. Condorcet's FBC problem, when Condorcet is in use.
>
> 2. Condorcet's enactment problem, due to being a complicated 
> rank-balloting contraption.
>
> You addressed #1, but not #2.

We're going in circles

[endquote]

But I've acknowledged your points on those two matters. That wasn't going in
circles. 

I agreed that maybe Condorcet could overcome its "complicated contraption"
disadvantage locally, municipally, if no big outside opposition comes in,
and if someone with Richie's money pushes it through.

I agreed that that maybe Condorcet can overcome its
"help-the-Democrat-against-the-Republican-as-much-as-possible" problem . For
instance, I agree that in municipal
Elections, parties aren't as important. Well, my only familiarity is with a
city and county where parties aren't allowed in municipal elections. I don't
know how much role parties have in other municipalities. But maybe, as you
said, municipal elections will be free enough of the lesser-evil problem, so
that voters will learn sincerity in Condorcet.

I acknowledged those things some time ago. 

And then I said: But wouldn't it be better to not _have_ those
disadvantages?  Yes, I've already said that. You may have answered it. But
it's undeniably better to not have a disadvantage.

You asked, in this message, why IRV wasn't stopped by the "complicated
contraption" argument, the argument that we don't know what it will do, and
it needs more study.
I already told you a theory: Money.

As an illustration of what I mean by "It's better to not have a
disadvantage", say Condorcet has a finite probability of getting enacted
municipally somewhere. But what if Approval has many times greater
probability of getting enacted municipally somewhere. You can propose
Condorcet in a municipal jurisdiction if you want to, but just know that its
probability of success will be a fraction of what Approval's
success-probability would be.

And then there's the possibility of state enactments, and even a national
law or court ruling, based on the absurdity of Plurality's forced
falsification. You said that slavery was first abolished in states, but my
point was merely that no matter how traditional slavery was, it was still
repealed because of its wrongness. Plurality's tradition can likewise be
beaten by its wrongness. In a voting rights court ruling, for instance.
There's obviously no chance of Condorcet being enacted by such a ruling.

And that's the other thing about the municipal route. It's very slow. If
Plurality's ridiculous wrongness can be shown, then there's a good chance of
repealing, by court action, the requirement, in Plurality, that makes it so
wrong: The forced falsification requirement.

You continued:

At this point you've said that Condorcet will get held up by people saying
'it is too complex, it needs more study'. Why? IRV didn't; and IRV is more
complex than Condorcet. 

[endquote]

Why? Because Plurality benefits some people, bigtime. If you benefited from
the status quo, then you'd hire someone to argue against changing it. That's
why.

You ask "Why didn't IRV have that opposition". I answered that maybe it
doesn't happen in every municipal campaign. Or maybe it didn't happen to
IRV, but would happen to Condorcet, because Condorcet is better than IRV. Or
maybe the promotional money made the difference in IRV's favor. Anyway, I'm
not saying that it necessarily has to happen in every municipal enactment
effort.

But it's something that I've heard when suggesting a voting system reform to
an elected representative. It's a sure thing that it will be said whenever
something new is proposed.

We aren't going in circles. I've agreed that Condorcet could overcome the
disadvantages, but I've said that it would be better to not have
disadvantages.

The expected time to enact Approval is shorter than the expected time to
enact Condorcet, due to the enactment disadvantage that Condorcet has. That
alone is a big
Advantage for Approval. 

Of course there's no reason that some people couldn't work for Condorcet
while others are working for Approval. It's just that the ones working for
Condorcet will probably take longer.

Now--Are we off the circle?





IRV's setbacks have, at least as far as I can see them, been primarily along
two points: first, arguments that IRV is a trick, or is unamerican, or only
Plurality is good enough for us (which also applies to Approval, see board
posts

[endquote]

...and I answered them. When people claimed that Approval would be worse, I
pointed out that they couldn't give a reason to support their claim. I told
of the simple difference with Approval, and I showed that there's no way
that could be worse.

That won't work with Condorcet, because it's far from obvious that that
complicated contraption won't be worse than Plurality. I'm not saying that
Condorcet might be worse than Plurality. I'm saying that you can't convince
people that it won't be.

A salesman comes to your door and shows you an expensive and complicated
paint-spraying machine. Another salesman shows you a paintbrush. You can see
the quality of brush bristles and handle-wood. You have to take the
machine-salesman's word for it what's in his machine, and that it's
reliable, that it won't go haywire or break down. You don't know the
machine's quality. The brush will be reliable. 

You said:

Compromising is a problem because Plurality compromise incentive is so
obvious.

[endquote]

No, I told you about two conversations, and one observed Condorcet
favorite-burial. I've experienced not one but two people who wanted to
favorite-bury with new and
better voting systems. I posted about that a week or so ago. I've talked to
very few people on that subject. For those two to both have that problem,
not just with Plurality, would be highly unlikely if it were something rare.
It's as if astronomers found that the nearest star had planets, but didn't
have the means to look farther. The fact that the one extrasolar star that
they can observe has planets would strongly imply that planets aren't rare.

You said:

But, as I have said, even under Plurality, the voters sometimes say "forget
about strategy", even on the national scale. Remember Ross Perot.

[endquote]

That's rare, and was only the result of Perot's money and consequent media
support. And even then there was a tremendous lesser-of-2-evils problem for
people who wanted to vote for Perot.

You continue:

I don't think the case is as clear cut as you say, either. Many other
Americans on the list support Condorcet even though they know that it
doesn't strictly meet FBC. 

[endquote]

As you know, that's because they don't think FBC will be a problem for
Condorcet. See above, where I told about my conversations with
favorite-buriers, and my observation of some Condorcet favorite-burial.

Maybe you're saying that polling reliably establishes which position is the
correct one  :-)

There also are Americans who say IRV or VoteFair is the best public
proposal. 

There are others who support Plurality, and argue against alternatives to
it. I wouldn't make that up!

Youl continued:

If it was obvious that compromise incentive is the big thing to the extent
that nothing short of FBC compliance could salvage a method, they would have
held other positions.

[endquote]

Ah, wouldn't it be nice if what is correct is always obvious to everyone!
:-)

Think about that for a moment. There's be no need to debate anything. We'd
have an ideal world.

Look, some people think Condorcet won't have a problem. Maybe there are more
of them. Maybe you think polling establishes correctness.\

Could it be that a majority was ever wrong about something? Maybe you think
that you can reasonably say that, judging only by the advocacy numbers, the
probability is greater that Condorcet doesn't have a problem. But you'd be
forgetting that there are a number of Approvalists too, though they aren't
active on EM right now. And there are also a number of RVists too All of
these people question the Condorcet's belief in Condorcet's
strategy-freeness.

The most recent time, so far as I'm aware, that EM conducted a poll on
voting systems, Approval won, by every method that we counted. Approval was
the CW. Approval was the Approval winner. As I said, Approval won by every
method that we did, including RV.

> Yes, that's right. Without favorite-burial incentive, you can kiss-off 
> the media-fabricated two-party system. The Democrat and Republican 
> parties would be history.
> Democrat and Republican politicians and party officials would have to 
> find other scams, other than politics. Maybe they can go into the 
> junkbond or S&L business, or something.
>
> We mustn't underestimate the degree that their electoral survival 
> depends on favorite-burial.

Sure, and if you could find a method that passes IIA, you would eliminate
every kind of strategic nomination incentive. But IIA is very strict,
probably too strict.

[endquote]

If you're referring to IIAC, Arrow's Independence from Irrelevant
Alternatives Criterion, then you _could_ find a method that meets IIAC. And,
guess what: Someone _has_
found one. It's called Approval.

Arrow's criteria and theorem really amount to a statement that rank methods
have certain problems.

Well, IIAC _will_ seem too strict if you're a Condorcetist :-)


(Strong FBC is even more strict - you pretty much have only Approval and
Antiplurality. I think someone wrote a paper about strong FBC earlier, and
that there were some Bucklinesque and non-majoritarian methods that also
passed it. However, you don't claim you need strong FBC, so that's a bit
besides the point.)

[endquote]

Strong FBC would obviously be better. I've been using the weaker version,
which I just call "FBC".  But don't try to discount the desirability of
Strong FBC. In any case, Approval meets both, and Condorcet meets neither.


> Rank methods are complicated contraptions. People won't know that they 
> don't have unintended, unexpected consequences that could be 
> disastrous. Media pundits, commentators, tv anchormen, newspaper and 
> magazine editors and writers, talk-show hosts, and hired university 
> authorities will say, "You don't know what that voting system will do. 
> We can' change our voting system without being sure that the new one 
> won't be a disaster. This needs a lot more study." And then, of 
> course, it will never happen.

And as you keep repeating that, I keep repeating: where were the "this needs
a lot more study" calls for IRV? Why did IRV, chaotic and nonmonotone in its
effects, not "never happen"?

[endquote]

I wasn't in the cities where IRV was enacted. In case you weren't aware of
this, one all important factor is the ratio of the money available to the
opponents, to the money available to the proponents. Richie was jetting
around the country, to banquets, probably power lunche, and taking key
people to dinner, etc. I'll bet that he could match the opponents' money.
Forgive me if I repeat, when answering, again, a repeated question.

And, as I've said every time you've asked that, maybe the full opposition
isn't always present, for every municipal enactment campaign. If so, then
maybe Condorcet can get lucky too.

But, as I said, I wasn't there. Remember that, above, I said that, even if
Condorcet could overcome (maybe) that disadvantage, the expected time until
its enactment is necessarily greater than the expected time until Approval's
enactment, due to the fact that Approval is the method that _doesn't_ have
that problem.

As you said, we've been over this. I've acknowledged that Condorcet might
overcome its disadvantages. Maybe. Better to not have them.



> That can't be said of Approval. Approval is the minimal fix of 
> Plurality's problem. Nothing other than the elimination of Plurality's 
> ridiculous forced-falsification requirement. I've told why it will be 
> obvious to all that that can only be an improvement.

But will it last, or will you get a situation analogous to the 1800 tie
between Jefferson and Burr? If the latter, couldn't that lead to
backsliding?

[endquote]

Nonsense. It's worse in Plurality. A problem that's worse in Plurality won't
make people want to go back to Plurality. In Plurality, if you help
Compromise, you're, without any doubt, completely kissisng-off any chance of
helping favorite _at all_, to any degree, against anyone.

And before you say that Condorcet, too, has the chicken dilemma: first, it
is not as obvious. Second, it requires more strategy on each side. 

[endquote]

You wish.

Wrong. Approval and Condorcet have that problem to the same degree. Same
problem. Try Condorcet in the Approval bad-examples that I posted. The
27,24,49 example, and the 33,32,34 example. Or anything inbetween.
Condorcet has the same problem.

You continued:

Third, despite how you keep repeating how "Condorcetists are in denial",
there *are* Condorcet methods that handle the chicken dilemma.

[endquote]

The problem can be solved in Approval, by any of the 5 ways that I've
described. It wouldn't surprise me if (using the necessary strategies) the
problem couldn't be solved in Condorcet too. Condorcet still has the
problem.

Another thing that I said, to which you might be referring is that Smith-Top
and Schartz-Top meet Condorcet's Criterion and are defection-resistant. Yes,
but those aren't the Condorcet versions that are being advocated by most
Condorcetists, are they. When you say Condorcet, you probably don't mean
Smith-Top or Schwartz-Top.

You continued:

Really, I suppose what my intuition is going by at this point is: we have
precedent that Approval has a very tense chicken dilemma situation, and that
it has harmed Approval.

[endquote]

Maybe, to the extent that Condorcetists don't know that Condorcet has the
same problem to the same degree.

And I repeat that the problem can be dealt with.

You continued:

We don't have any precedent for a similar situation harming ranked ballot
methods that have been tried. 
Where they have been reverted, it has not been because of chicken dilemma
situations.

[endquote]

Maybe or maybe not. Maybe you're saying that though Condorcet has that
problem too, it's easier to get distracted by the complexity, and to forget
about the problem.  I don't know. Neither you nor I know if that's happened
with Condorcet or Approval.

And no, co-operation/defection wouldn't cause people to go from Approval
back to Plurality, because it's worse in Plurality.


> Remember that Condorcet's winnability problem has nothing to do with 
> FBC. It's the "complicated contraption" problem that I spoke of 
> above--a problem that Approval, uniquely, doesn't have.

And presumably a problem that IRV had, or Bucklin, or that even more complex
thing used in New York, STV. Where were the "complicated contraption" voices
then?

[endquote]

I've answered that several times about IRV. I wasn't there. Promotional
money probably helped. Maybe that kind of opposition sometimes doesn't come
to town. As for Bucklin and STV, those were more progressive days,
electorally. People were more willing to experiment. Bucklin and STV were
gotten rid of when they were found to be electing Communists and other
socialists. Maybe too there were racial results that bothered some
higher-ups. Anyway, whatever the reason was, that ended the days of free
electoral experimentation. 

Those early 20th century days were quite progressive in some ways. The
League of Nations almost adopted a reform calendar. Elizabeth Achellis's
World Calendar would probably have been accepted if she'd been willing to
drop the "blank days" that messed up the sequence of the days of the week,
something that greatly put off some religions. She insisted on that because
it's one way to get a "fixed calendar", a calendar that is the same every
year. The religious organizations offered her another way to get a fixed
calendar, by "leap-weeks" instead of leap days, but she wouldn't budge.
Anyway, the League of Nations would probably have adopted her new calendar
if she'd been a little more accommodating.
Those days of free experimentation are over now.

You continued:

And where did the complicated contraption voices get top-two runoff
disbanded? Limited voting? I don't think it's unique to Approval.

[endquote]

Limited voting was a product of that more progressive era.

Top two runoff isn't complicated like Condorcet.

> You continued:
>
> It [Approval] has the defection problem
>
> [endquote]
>
> So does Condorcet, to the same degree. So let's not use that to 
> compare those  2 methods--except that it's why I say that Condorcet 
> doesn't significantly  improve on Approval.

To the same degree? No. If voters just rank and don't strategically consider
whether to defect or not, there's no problem

[endquote]

So there's no problem when there's no defection? :-)  

I've already said that Condorcet is fine when everyone ranks sincerely.

And I'll say this again: Sure, if everyone ranks sincerely, in the Approval
bad-examples, the CW  wins if there is one. A wins. If A and B voters
approve A and B in Approval, then they'll be close to a tie, or the winner
among them will be decided by others. So, under sincere voting, Condorcet
does great. But I never denied that. The problem is that there are strategy
incentives.

 
You continued:

 but in Approval, they can't "just Approve" without using implicit
strategies outside of the method itself. Honest voters don't have to put any
cutoff anywhere in a ranked method. They still have to put the cutoff
somewhere in Approval. Sure, they can use strategies to guide where that
cutoff has to be set, but they still have to set it.

[endquote]

You don't like for me to repeat things, but I've said this before too:
Honest voters don't have to strategize in Approval. Vote for whom you like,
trust, or consider deserving of your support. Forget about strategy.

Yes, you can strategize if you want to. I've suggested some easy and simple
strategies. 

You seem to be saying that Condorcet is better if everyone votes sincerely.
You're hoping that they will. Dream on.

And remember, if it's a u/a election, is it really so difficult to vote for
all the acceptables and not for any of the unacceptable? I claim all of our
elections are u/a.

You continued:

Let's be a little more formal about this. Consider left-right politics with
voters and candidates on a line, voters preferring candidates closer to
themselves. Now, let's assume some candidates are close enough and have a
common base by enough that two of them have nearly the same amount of
Approvals.

To get the right winner in Approval, the voters have to fine-tune so that
they don't get the other close candidate. 

[endquote]

No, they don't. If you like them both, then approve them both. 

If you're talking about defection decisions, Condorcet's guaranteed CW-win
under sincere voting won't help you. The same problem remains. If the other
guy is the CW, you might take his win if you don't rank him. Just because he
might he CW doesn't mean you don't prefer your own candidate winning. 


You continued:

No big deal, maybe? But in Condorcet, the voters just rank all the
candidates and everything works properly

[endquote]

...if everyone ranks all the candidates :-)

But, as I said, just because the rival might be CW doesn't mean you wouldn't
rather elect your favorite instead.

And I trust that you haven't forgotten about the favorite-burial incentive.
The problems that I named are there. It's unrealistic to count on sincere
voting in public political elections.
If I, as do you, believed that everyone would vote sincerely in Condorcet,
then I too would advocate Condorcet for public political elections.

You continued:

Or to put it in another way: Approval has a semi-honest/honest problem where
Condorcet has none. When everybody are rational game theorists, then "Plain
Condorcet" (i.e. not CT, Smith,Plurality, Smith,DAC or
similar) is just as bad as Approval, true. But when the voters just want to
get out there and vote... then it's not "to the same degree". It is not "to
the same degree" when the fraction that votes honestly can shield against
the effects of those that don't, either.

[endquote]

...Sometimes they can't do so when voting sincerely. Ideally Condorcet does
the right thing when everyone votes sincerely. No one's denying that.

To be continued...

Mike Ossipoff