[EM] No. Condorcet and Hare do not share the same problem with computational complexity and process transparency.

Richard Lung voting at ukscientists.com
Tue Mar 26 00:35:31 PDT 2024


Thank you for your reply.

Perhaps you have "no idea" because your reasoning doesn't strictly 
follow. And perhaps you jump in with your (further) "No" without a real 
disagreement.

Apportionment has its place in Congress, for instance, but is the 
feature of oligarchic party list systems, in the context of voting 
methods discussed, and quotas the feature of democratic forms of 
"proportional representation."

Regards,

Richard Lung.


On 25/03/2024 23:42, Closed Limelike Curves wrote:
>
>     As for the profered non-monotonicity reason for abolishing STV,
>     this is solely in the Arrow-theorem-doctrinaire critics
>     imagination, bearing no connection to reality.
>
> No idea what this refers to, given STV isn't related to Arrow's theorem.
>
>     The non-monotonicity of STV just owes to it trailing a remnant of
>     plurality voting, in its "last past the post" exclusion count.
>
>
> No, the issue is the multi-stage method—the more elimination rounds 
> you have, the more likely you are to have a negative voting weight 
> event. Pretty much every sequential-loser method has the same problem.
>
>      The Surplus transfer election count, especially Meek method, is
>     monotonic.
>
> That's also not correct; see Pukelsheim's book on apportionment for 
> why every quota rule method is nonmonotonic. I do think /most/ of 
> STV's nonmonotonicity comes down to the IRV elimination, though.
>
> On Mon, Mar 25, 2024 at 12:39 PM Richard Lung 
> <voting at ukscientists.com> wrote:
>
>
>     Exactly so, Michael Garman. opposition was incited against STV
>     because: You'll get a black mayor.
>
>     Indeed you would. The one or two communists elected by STV in NYC
>     were representing sweated labour in the textile industry. No
>     mention of the fact that abolishing STV gave one-party rule. In
>     NYC the Machine, Tammany Hall bankrupted the city, for the classic
>     reason of lack of opposition holding to account. The city machines
>     held "battering ram" referendums with the money and publicity on
>     side. They succumbed to the onslaught except in Cambridge with a
>     30,000 strong MIT, which had to endure 6 referendums in 16 years.
>     Such was the fanatical meal-ticket politics of the one-party
>     machines. STV had been promoted, despite politicians power-greed,
>     by mathematicians, who knew their business and weren't afraid of
>     "the key to democracy."
>
>     As for the profered non-monotonicity reason for abolishing STV,
>     this is solely in the Arrow-theorem-doctrinaire critics
>     imagination, bearing no connection to reality. The
>     non-monotonicity of STV just owes to it trailing a remnant of
>     plurality voting, in its "last past the post" exclusion count. The
>     Surplus transfer election count, especially Meek method, is monotonic.
>
>     I have invented an STV exclusion count which is an iteration of
>     the election count; both therefore monotonic; a "scientific"
>     one-truth voting method, unlike other voting methods the world
>     uses. I posted programmers links, none of which, the list manager
>     has so far redeemed.
>
>     Regards,
>
>     Richard Lung.
>
>
>     On 25/03/2024 17:18, Michael Garman wrote:
>>     Much of the opposition to STV came from the fact that it was
>>     electing — shudder! black people and even communists — in a
>>     political climate where those were seen as two of the worst
>>     traits a politician could have. That, more than non-monotonicity,
>>     was what did it in in NYC and elsewhere. I don’t find
>>     “reactionaries won’t like it” to be a convincing argument against
>>     progress.
>>
>>
>>     On Mon, Mar 25, 2024 at 6:08 PM Closed Limelike Curves
>>     <closed.limelike.curves at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>             I'm all for convincing people of the need for reform
>>             first and foremost and then convincing them of specific
>>             methods later. Now, you could argue that certain reforms
>>             would turn the public off the idea of structural change
>>             once and for all, and I'd take those concerns seriously.
>>
>>         I don't think convincing people the current system is bad is
>>         very helpful unless you have a better alternative. People
>>         tend to flail about and pick the first system they think of
>>         or hear about—like IRV—and sometimes even pick a disastrous
>>         system like Borda. After a state or city picks a new system,
>>         they usually stick with it for decades out of pure inertia,
>>         meaning it locks us out of systems that actually improve the
>>         election's results. If nothing else, promoting these systems
>>         wastes time and effort that could be better-spent elsewhere.
>>
>>         It's also easier to argue for a better policy than a worse
>>         one. If reform movements didn't have so many problems with
>>         Nobel-laureate economists and political scientists writing
>>         newspaper articles and papers about IRV not working that
>>         well, and didn't have major disasters like Alaska's 2022
>>         election to deal with, things would probably be an easier sell.
>>
>>         It's worth noting we have a case study of this. During the
>>         Progressive Era in the 1910s, lots of US cities adopted new
>>         voting systems, typically STV. These rules survived only a
>>         few decades before repeal. Most famously, in New York, STV
>>         caused so many monotonicity failures that the city decided to
>>         kill the only large-scale proportional representation system
>>         in the United States after officials derided it for being a
>>         lottery.
>>
>>         It's taken 100 years for the electoral reform movement to
>>         recover and get a second chance. I don't want to wait another
>>         100 years for a reform that might actually stick this time.
>>
>>         On Sun, Mar 24, 2024 at 4:12 PM Michael Garman
>>         <michael.garman at rankthevote.us> wrote:
>>
>>             >  Note that I'm not asking if you think the fool me
>>             twice problem is
>>             likely to happen with IRV. Just whether it's reasonable
>>             for someone who
>>             thinks enacting a (to his mind) flawed method can cause a
>>             backlash, to
>>             not go for that method.
>>
>>             For sure. It's a reasonable argument.
>>
>>             I think the principal consideration to bear in mind is
>>             where the opposition is coming from and what their
>>             arguments are. If I were an activist in a community where
>>             the prevailing opinion was that reform was necessary, I'd
>>             be all for having a debate about the merits of different
>>             methods and the relative logistical complications they
>>             might pose.
>>
>>             My concern right now is that most people aren't open to
>>             /any/ reform, and if the public-facing image they see is
>>             a reform movement that can't even agree on a measure to
>>             push, they'll be even more skeptical. Not that we can't
>>             or shouldn't have these debates, of course. But I think
>>             the Seattle 2022 example -- where the IRV supporters were
>>             at fault! -- is exactly the opposite of what we want to
>>             happen. Overall support for the first part of the
>>             question -- the one that was essentially "should we scrap
>>             FPP?" was way lower than it would have been if there
>>             hadn't been confusion over competing proposals and the
>>             impression of a fractured reform community.
>>
>>             I'm all for convincing people of the need for reform
>>             first and foremost and then convincing them of specific
>>             methods later. Now, you could argue that certain reforms
>>             would turn the public off the idea of structural change
>>             once and for all, and I'd take those concerns seriously.
>>
>>             On Sun, Mar 24, 2024 at 8:07 PM Kristofer Munsterhjelm
>>             <km_elmet at t-online.de> wrote:
>>
>>                 On 2024-03-20 09:57, Michael Garman wrote:
>>                 > To be clear, I am by no means a believer that IRV
>>                 is the only reform
>>                 > worth pursuing, or that it’s anywhere close to the
>>                 perfect system.
>>                 >
>>                 > Where Michael and I disagree is on the role of
>>                 pragmatism. I believe
>>                 > that any time an alternative to plurality voting is
>>                 on the ballot,
>>                 > voters should support it. I think the folks in
>>                 Eugene, Oregon, should
>>                 > vote yes on STAR. I think more places should try
>>                 out approval. Beyond
>>                 > those three, I read this list because I enjoy
>>                 learning about completely
>>                 > new and different systems that would be fascinating
>>                 to see in practice
>>                 > somewhere one day. But in a place where citizens
>>                 are asked for an up or
>>                 > down vote on IRV vs. FPTP, I don’t see how you can
>>                 defend voting for the
>>                 > worst possible system because the proposed reform
>>                 isn’t exactly what
>>                 > you’d like.
>>
>>                 What do you think about the following reasoning? Call
>>                 it the "fool me
>>                 twice" problem.
>>
>>                 Suppose that a jurisdiction is considering switching
>>                 from FPTP to Borda.
>>                 The main organization is heavily marketing Borda as
>>                 the one ranked
>>                 voting system, equating the ranked ballot format to
>>                 Borda, the method.
>>
>>                 Meanwhile, an organization promoting MDDA (majority
>>                 defeat
>>                 disqualification approval) is slowly growing. Someone
>>                 (call him John)
>>                 favors MDDA and thinks that due to Borda's clone
>>                 problem, it will
>>                 quickly be repealed. Then, he reasons, the
>>                 jurisdiction will think that
>>                 ranking equals Borda, so that when some other ranked
>>                 method is proposed
>>                 (MDDA, say), they will remember the failure of Borda
>>                 that led to its
>>                 repeal and say "no; fool me twice, shame on me".
>>
>>                 Suppose for the sake of argument that there is a
>>                 considerable chance
>>                 that Borda would be repealed if it were enacted, and
>>                 a lesser chance
>>                 that MDDA would. Is then John in the right to
>>                 withhold his support for
>>                 Borda? Would it be right for the MDDA organization to
>>                 try to counter the
>>                 Borda organization's marketing by saying more ranked
>>                 methods exist, even
>>                 if doing so reduces the chance that Borda is enacted?
>>
>>                 Note that I'm not asking if you think the fool me
>>                 twice problem is
>>                 likely to happen with IRV. Just whether it's
>>                 reasonable for someone who
>>                 thinks enacting a (to his mind) flawed method can
>>                 cause a backlash, to
>>                 not go for that method.
>>
>>                 -km
>>
>>             ----
>>
>>
>>             Election-Methods mailing list - see
>>             https://electorama.com/em for list info
>>
>>
>>     ----
>>     Election-Methods mailing list - seehttps://electorama.com/em  for list info
>
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