[EM] Yes/?/No

[Kristofer Munsterhjelm]

On 07/11/2020 07.34, Andy Jennings wrote:
> On Sat, Oct 31, 2020 at 6:34 PM robert bristow-johnson
> <rbj at audioimagination.com <mailto:rbj at audioimagination.com>> wrote:
> 
> 
>     > On 10/31/2020 9:03 PM Forest Simmons <fsimmons at pcc.edu
>     <mailto:fsimmons at pcc.edu>> wrote:
>     >
>     >
>     > Approval is one of the easiest election methods to explain and to
>     understand; the ballots are identical to traditional FPP ballots
>     except the instructions now say to mark the names of all of the
>     candidates that you like instead of only one of them. As before the
>     winner is the candidate with the greatest number of likes.
>     >
>     > But what about the candidates that you just like a little bit? Do
>     you include them or not? Where do you draw the line between like and
>     not like?
>     >
> 
>     i've been trying for a couple years to get the Election Science
>     people to answer that simple question.  should a voter approve of
>     their second choice or not?  there is no simple answer and the voter
>     is burdened with the task of tactical voting.
> 
> 
> Approve your favorite. Disapprove your least-favorite.
> 
> Now imagine if the decision were between just those two, and it was
> being decided with a coin flip.
> 
> For each of the others, would you rather have them win or take the
> chance on the coin flip between your most-favored candidate and your
> least-favored candidate?
> 
> If you would prefer that candidate to the coin flip, then approve them.
> If you'd rather take your chances with the coin flip, then disapprove them.

Doesn't that fail IIA in a very drastic manner? Suppose election A has a
left-wing candidate, a center candidate, and a right-wing candidate, all
of them respectable. Election B has these three plus someone who wants
to turn the country into a dictatorship.

It seems intuitively wrong that election A should pick (say) the center
candidate while election B should be a three-way tie just because all
the respectable candidates are preferable to a coin flip between the
favorite and the candidate with dictatorial ambitions.