[EM] Hay guys, look at this...

[robert bristow-johnson]

> On 02/17/2023 7:32 AM EST Kristofer Munsterhjelm <km_elmet at t-online.de> wrote:
> 
>  
> On 2/17/23 04:46, robert bristow-johnson wrote:
> >   https://drive.google.com/file/d/1qnSE5wPa1y7k-Y_zblLRwxc2Ol1QmrUs/view?usp=share_link
> 
> Nice! Two comments:
> 
> - The ballot format allows for equal rank. I'm not familiar with legal 
> language, but from the document, it seems like everything needs to be 
> precisely described.

I think we want our laws to be precisely described.  Otherwise we leave too much to the judges.

> Thus it might be a good idea to specify how 
> equal-rank first preferences are counted: does A=B>C give one point to 
> both A and B, or half a point to both?

This isn't Borda.  There are no "points".  We want to make sure, as I pointed out (in my paper) with the North Dakota Supreme Court ruling of 1911, that what we are ultimately counting are ***people***.  Not points, not marks, not scores, but people.

So we got this definition:
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(5) “Paired comparison” or “head-to-head comparison” means an evaluation of two candidates for the purpose of determining which candidate has the greater number of ballots ranking that candidate over the other candidate in the pair.
______________________________


and we got this provision:

______________________________

(d)(1) Additional tabulation. Upon tabulation of the ballots, if no candidate receives a majority of first-ranked preferences, the ballots shall be tabulated again by paired comparison and examining every possible paired comparison. In each paired comparison, the presiding officer shall note the winning candidate in each paired comparison or if there is instead a tie.
(2) Condorcet winner. If a candidate is the winning candidate in every
paired comparison, the candidate shall be declared the winner of the election.
(3) No Condorcet winner. If there is no candidate that is the winning candidate in every paired comparison, then the candidate having the plurality of first-ranking preferences is declared the winner.
______________________________


Now, perhaps the language here:

"... the presiding officer shall note the winning candidate in each paired comparison or if there is instead a tie ..."

needs to be more explicit about what the meaning of being a winning candidate in a particular paired comparison.

It's only if one candidate receives *more* votes than the other, that they are a winning candidate.  Tying with the other candidate does not mean either is a winning candidate.

> 
> - There's a chance it would backfire if someone engineers a Condorcet 
> cycle. Perhaps better is that the highest Plurality scorer among the 
> candidates with the highest number of pairwise wins, wins instead? 
> That's Copeland,Plurality and thus Smith.
> 
> Of course, if the legislative document is meant to implement 
> Condorcet,Plurality specifically (and it's past the "which method do we 
> choose" stage), then disregard what I just said and go for 
> Condorcet,Plurality - we'll see how it goes :-)
> 
> -km

--

r b-j . _ . _ . _ . _ rbj at audioimagination.com

"Imagination is more important than knowledge."

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