[EM] Poll question and voting period

[Michael Ossipoff]

On Thu, Apr 18, 2024 at 22:35 Chris Benham <cbenhamau at yahoo.com.au> wrote:

>
> How are we supposed to know what is "proposable" and what isn't?
>
If you’ve talked to a few people, you’ll Jayant idea how much
complicatedness is considered acceptable to people.

You can tell if a method is complicated. Approval isn’t complicated.
Margins-Sorted Approval & other double-sort methods are more complicated
than people want to hear about. It’s important to talk to people. You’ll
see what I mean.

You don’t need a distinction-line for unproposability. …& no one’s
evaluating the qualification of each of us to judge any aspect of merit,
including proposability.

This isn’t complicated or PhD-requiring: Just rank according to your
perception, your feeling, about how suitable for a public-proposal a method
is. That can be based on merit-in-use, or proposability, or any combination
of those. …& if you don’t think proposability matters, then that, too, is
your call when you rank for suitability for proposal

My point is, no one’ expecting anyone to be an infallible expert with the
right judgment.

So don’t worry about it.

If you personally feel that proposability doesn’t matter, or that you can’t
judge it, then that, too, is your call.

…but you really can’t make that judgment for the rest of us.


No one will question your judgment.

(well, I might argue with you during the electioneering & voting period, to
influence other voters, but no one questions your judgment & qualification
to rank as you perceive.)

> Or assuming we have some idea about that, how do we know exactly where the
> border between proposable and unproposable (which presumably varies a bit
> over time and from place to place) is?
>
> I suggest that we limit ourselves (for the time being) to methods that we
> think at least might be proposable, being the more optimistic in this
> regard the greater the method's merit.
>
> Our aim should be to produce an order of merit and leave the question of
> exactly how proposable this-or-that method is to would-be proposers. So if
> for example they don't think that the method at the top of our order is
> proposable, then they can just look down it until they find one that they
> think  is.
>
> From this perspective it would be useful to include advice on what are the
> best balloting rules and which methods work best with various ballot rules
> and restrictions.
>
> For example I find that limiting (in either direction) the number of
> candidates the voter can to rank from the top to be unacceptable.  It is
> particularly galling if the method meets Later-no-Harm and Clone
> Independence (like Hare, aka single-winner STV, aka the Alternative Vote).
>
> Also some methods are happier than others depending on whether or not
> above-bottom equal ranking is allowed.  Allowing equal-ranking in Hare
> either makes the method a lot more complicated or more vulnerable to
> Push-over strategy.
>
> But most Condorcet methods are happy to allow equal-ranking and can use
> even limited-slot ratings ballots (such as ABCD grading ballots).
>
> Some indication of merit gaps, particularly in comparison with methods
> currently in use and methods that already have some significant profile
> and/or traction, would also be ideal.
>
> Chris B.
>
>
>
>
> *Michael Ossipoff* email9648742 at gmail.com
> <election-methods%40lists.electorama.com?Subject=Re%3A%20%5BEM%5D%20Poll%20question%20and%20voting%20period&In-Reply-To=%3CCAOKDY5B2mGiZF2EMqOguX-9RvNpALNx4jmesVAfvUPVcv-dHkQ%40mail.gmail.com%3E>
> *Thu Apr 18 18:01:47 PDT 2024*
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Yes,  that’s how I initially proposed it; but later, 2 people objected to
> the unproposable complexity of many of the nominees.
>
> By that time, I’d noticed the logical fault in my initial wording that
> explicitly excluded proposability from consideration. So, when those 2
> people objected about unproposability, that told me that it was permissible
> &. constructive for me to ask for the removal of the clause saying to
> disregard proposability.
>
> Of course that clause made no sense. It was a logical-typo.
>
> …because, if a method is unproposable, then its merit-in-use is quite
> irrelevant,  since it can’t get in use.
>
> So the change that I asked for at that time, encouraged by those 2 people’s
> objections about unproposability, wasn’t to change the spirit or intent of
> the proposal..but only to correct a logically nonsensical error in the
> initial wording.
>
> So, my request is to simplify the wording by removing that illogical
> exclusion of proposability as a consideration, & simply ask that methods be
> ranked according to their suitability for public proposal.  … which
> automatically includes both proposability *and* merit-in-use.
>
> …because obviously the merit-in-use of an unproposable method is irrelevant.
>
> On Thu, Apr 18, 2024 at 14:49 Kristofer Munsterhjelm <km_elmet at t-online.de <http://lists.electorama.com/listinfo.cgi/election-methods-electorama.com>>
> wrote:
>
> >* Alright, now that I've got a little bit more time, here's the post that
> *>* I was intending to write.
> *>>* In the original EM post, Michael Ossipoff suggested there be a week-long
> *>* nomination period and then a month-long voting period. Since nobody
> *>* proposed otherwise, that's what we went with.
> *>>* Since the voting period started at 2024-04-11 05:15:00 UTC that means
> *>* that the voting deadline is
> *>>* 2024-05-11 05:15:00 UTC, inclusive.
> *>>* As for the question, MO said this:
> *>>* > This poll is intended to be about merit-in-use. ...disregarding
> *>* > winnability & proposability.  ...but taking into account
> *>* > strategy-problems,, expense of implementation, expense & difficulty of
> *>* > administration, complexity & consequent insecurity of count, &
> *>* > consequent count-fraud vulnerability.   So, it's about merit-in-use, in
> *>* > all its aspects.
> *>>* So, as I understand it, the question would be:
> *>>* "What methods do you consider to have the greatest merit in use for
> *>* public elections?
> *>>* For the ranked ballot, rank the methods in order of merit.
> *>>* Every aspect relevant to the methods' suitability for public use is
> *>* relevant: including vulnerability to strategy, expense of implementation
> *>* and administration, count complexity, and vulnerability to fraud.
> *>>* However, the answer should not take into account whether the method is
> *>* currently being proposed by an advocacy group, nor how much momentum a
> *>* particular group or reform movement, if it exists, enjoys at the moment."
> *>>* MO: Does that sound about right?
> *>>* (I didn't add a description of how to do Approval because lots of
> *>* different approaches and heuristics exist.)
> *>>* -km*
>
>
>
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