[EM] Chicken Dilemma--To whom is it a problem? KV to MO

[Michael Ossipoff]

Kevin--

You wrote:

> I would agree that an MMC violation would be a greater outrage than
> an SDSC violation. But I think MMC's premise would apply exceedingly
> rarely. That is why I think MMC is not a very useful guarantee.

Sure SDSC's premise would apply more frequently than that of MMC. That
used to put me off, too, about MMC.

But if some set of voters agree on certain basic important things,
differing only in details, and in their beliefs that their own party
is the solution, then is it unlikely that theyd all prefer eachother's
policy-proposals to the alternatives?

All that is required for mutuality is agreement on some basic
important matters. Maybe I'm optimistic, to believe that a
majority-size group could be mutual in that regard. The media tell us
that the public are nearly all divided between Democrat and Republican
(whose policiesare nearly indistinguihable). If that were really true,
then it goes without saying that they'd be a mutual majority, against
the dramatically-different progressives.

But polls, and things that people say, suggest that there's another
kind of mutuality, not supporting unnecessary war, and wanting much
better equality, and agreeing about the corruptness of Republocrat
politicians.

The progressive parties look mutual, when we examine their pltforms.
The material life-quality improvements that they all propose are
remarkably identical, despite their other differences, and their
rivalry. Speaking as a progressive myself, I'd rank every progressive
party over the Republocrats (except for a very few that seem too
antagonistic to be promising). I feel that all progressives would
notice the similarity in their platform proposals, and that they, like
me, would all prefer eachtohers' proposals to the policies of the
Republocrats. So, I think that the progressives are mutual, and that,
if they turn out to be a majority, then they'll be a mutual majority.

Given the lack of available information, it can't be said for sure
whether that mutual progressive opinion would be a majority (if people
knew what the parties offered, and knew that they weren't alone in
preferring honesty, peace, humanitarianism and equality).

It seems to me that it's natural that if the A voters think that B's
policies are similar enough to their own, so that they prefer B to C,
then the B voters would also perceive that policy-similiarity. So
mutuality doesn't seem like it would be rare.

Yes, I know that one scenario has B somewhere between A and C, maybe
halfway between, resulting in indifference between A and C. But how
likely is it that B would be exactly halfway inbetween? Isn't it much
more likely that B would be closer to one than to the other? ...in
which case there would be a {B,A} mutual majority, or a {B,C} mutual
majority.

...And that's not even counting the fact that C favors the rich few,
is known by all to be corrupt, inimical to the interests of nearly
everyone, and that its two wings, Cdem and Crepub, are only voted-for
due to misinformed resignation and belief that they're all that there
is.

>> As for why SDSC-failure isn't an outrage, look at candidate B's
>> win-qualifications, in your 2nd example:
>>
>> The B voters want B to be elected by a majority coalition that they
>> don't support. They have no right to expect anything from that
>> non-existent majority coalition.
>>
>> B isn't CW. There is no voted CW. If the B voters are sincere in their
>> truncation, there's no sincere CW either.
>>
>
> Sure, by MMC or Condorcet logic there is no basis. It's purely about
> seeing the majority specifically. Why do they matter: Since via
> insincerity the majority can achieve any outcome it could want, when
> you violate SDSC you can be confident that a majority didn't get
> what it would have wanted, and that it could have secured it via some
> other way of voting.

True, if the A voters knew that the B voters definitely didn't like A,
and that, due to CD-compliance, C was going to win, then they might
feel strategically forced to rank B equal to A, in order to save B and
defeat C. But if B is between A and C, then why don't the C voters
like B better than A? If they do, and they surely would, then B would
win as CW, in Benham or Woodall.

B voters being indifferent between A and C; and C voters being
indifferent between A and B--That doesn't seem likely. Yes, perceiving
the differences that the A voters perceive, the C voters might see B
as unacceptable. But, pereiving those same differences, wouldn't the B
voters prefer A to C?

In my chicken-dilemma examples (and probably in the one that were used
against Approval), the C voters are indifferent between A and C, just
to simpliy the example.

So, it seems to me that Benham or Woodall having the problem in your
2nd example, doesn't sound plausible.

I'm aware of the importance of not letting the defense of a prior
position become more important than the fair assessment of the
situation. If I'm doing that, it's unintentional.

GPUS, G/GPUSA, Justice Party, and nearly all of the many various
diverse socialist parties, all are proposing the same life-quality
improvements, dramatically distinguishing them, together, from the
Republocrats. That looks to me like mutuality. The Pirate Party,
though its platform doesn't say as much, still sounds like the
progressive parties in what it does say. As a progressive, I'd rank
all of the progressive parties, including Pirate, over the
Republocrats.

And if there's to be any improvement, then there would need to be a
majority for it.

A need to sincerely vote that mutuality, in order to benefit from the
mutual majority, seems to be what could rein-in the fractious,
rivalrous nature of the overall progressive voter-set.

Different people look at different aspects of the situation, and maybe
it can't be established which assessment is right, but I've just been
telling the reasons for my assessment, and for my MMC + CD + CC
preference that follows from that assesment (with regard to the Green
scenario)

A lot of people, disagreeing with me, feel that voting-system reform
can happen under the Republocrats, under current conditions. That
assumption would favor FBC as the important criterion, it seems to me,
leading to a preference for Approval or Score (but maybe ICT--For
those who don't choose to vote Approval-like, and want to vote between
the acceptables, CD still matters, and if FBC+CD is incompatible with
MMC, then we'd have settle for "usually won't fail MMC").

> More precisely I do not want a majority to complain that the result
> is spoiled, in a situation where you can look at the ballots and see
> that the winner is the one guy with the only majority-strength loss.

Majority wishes should be respected. But the threat of the majority
losing to C can serve as a deterrent for letting it happen due to
insincere defection. In your 2nd example, if I were an A voter, would
Benham or Woodall force me to equal-rank A and B, because B won't
support A? Not if A is Justice Party and B is Greens or SPUSA.

And it's my subjective impression that the progressives have a lot
more to fear from rivalry among themselves, than from genuine
indifference between eachother and the Republcrats.


>
> Also, when the method can't see past unviable "noise" candidates
> there is pressure not to nominate or vote for them. I tend to think
> that without SDSC, the prerequisite situations for CD and MMC won't
> even happen, because it's too dangerous to those would-be coalitions.
>
> It's definitely my beliefs about nomination disincentive that will
> keep us in disagreement on this issue.

I'm proposing for a hypothetical future time when FBC  is no longer
necessary. For now, if we could get voting-system reform, I agree that
FBC would now be necessary.

>
>>
>> I don't know if MMC,CD, CC and SDSC are compatible. Probably not,
>> because I don't know of a method that meets them all.
>>
>
My immediate question would be whether
> CD is sufficiently distant from LNHarm that it could be
> compatible with Condorcet

CD is compatible with Condorcet. Benahm and Woodall comply with both CD and CC.

They both comply with CD and Smith.

Yes, LNHa looks like stronger, more general, relative of CD.

CD is like a special-case LNHa protection.

>
>> I don't know of a method that meets MMC, CD and FBC either. That
>> combination, too, is probably incopatible.
>>
>
> MMPO (break ties with FPP) would be the closest I think. If
> they are incompatible, the likely reason is that the clone-proofing
> needed for MMC is too "path-tracey" for FBC. MMC+FBC is not
> impossible, as in ER-Bucklin, but LNHarm is completely lost there.

And CD too.

At one time, I proposed ER-Bucklin, with its MMC modiication, and with
optional conditional support, to let people avoid chicken dilemma via
conditional votes.. I described a workable method, but then I realized
that optional condtional support can be taken adantage of, to make a
sort of secondary chicken dilemma.

But, before I noticed that, I thought that I had a method that met
MMC, CD, and FBC.

Michael Ossipoff