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

[Forest Simmons]

The candidate left unranked on the fewest ballots may be a better choice of
default, because plurality is subject to vote splitting ... the main
motivation for voting reform in the first place.

On Fri, Feb 17, 2023, 11:47 AM robert bristow-johnson <
rbj at audioimagination.com> wrote:

>
>
> > On 02/17/2023 1:13 PM EST KenB <kdbearman at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >
> > On 2/17/2023 10:48 AM, robert bristow-johnson wrote:
> >
> > > >
> https://drive.google.com/file/d/1qnSE5wPa1y7kY_zblLRwxc2Ol1QmrUs/view
> > > >
> > > ______________________________
> > >
> > > (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.
> > > ______________________________
> > = = = = =
> >  [KB] Do I understand paragraph (3) correctly: If there's no Condorcet
> winner, then you default to a First Past the Post winner?
> >
>
> Yes, given current usage data in the U.S., this is what happens about 0.2%
> of the RCV elections.  Out of over 500 RCV elections in the U.S., *only*
> *once* did the election demonstrate a cycle.  And that was Minneapolis Ward
> 2 in 2021.  (And BTW, Nicolaus Tideman analyzed this and thinks that this
> evidence of a cycle is inconclusive because they had only 3 ranking levels
> and 5 or 6 candidates.  But, as the ballots were marked and assuming none
> of the voters would have ranked anyone below 3rd-choice if there was more
> ranking levels, then it was a cycle.)
>
> Now, in my opinion, the problem here becomes a political problem that
> might eclipse the technical problem.  The technical problem is about how to
> keep any cycle from being gamed or incentivizing tactical/strategic voting
> in future elections.  This is a quite esoteric technical problem and I
> would invite Markus or Nic or anyone else with their Condorcet-consistent
> method to explain it to a bunch of legislators, let alone the public.
>
> We explain Condorcet this way: If a simple majority of voters mark their
> ballots preferring Candidate A over Candidate B, then Candidate B is not
> elected.
>
> Why *should* Candidate B be elected?  The IRV people twist themselves into
> pretzels trying to answer that.  (Their answer is either "we've been doing
> it this way for several decade and IRV is well tested" or, when challenged
> that the "well tested" has shown failure in 3 out of 500 cases, then they
> trot out the old "Candidate Milquetoast" argument, saying, essentially that
> IRV saved us from getting Montroll in 2009 or Begich in 2022 because they
> are both milquetoast and "kiss the baby" candidates.  A real horseshit
> argument.)
>
> So, in the less than 0.2% of the cases where it is impossible to satisfy
> the simple ethical principle of the Condorcet criterion, then we have to
> explain to the public how and why the candidate who was elected was
> chosen.  What is it about this winning candidate that makes him/her a more
> appropriate choice for election to office than any other candidate in the
> Smith set?  What, that the public can see and discern, indicates electoral
> support?  How would we answer that question?
>
> That California bill (from a previous session, I believe it's a dead bill
> now) used the Hare IRV winner as the contingency winner if no Condorcet
> winner.
> https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202120220AB2161
> I think that, for less than 0.2%, defending this choice over plurality is
> difficult.
>
> --
>
> r b-j . _ . _ . _ . _ rbj at audioimagination.com
>
> "Imagination is more important than knowledge."
>
> .
> .
> .
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