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Jobst,<br>
You wrote:<br>
<blockquote type="cite">
<pre wrap="">Although I don't believe that all voters are utility maximizers, I still
think that voters who <b class="moz-txt-star"><span class="moz-txt-tag">*</span>are<span
class="moz-txt-tag">*</span></b> utility maximizers should be encouraged by
the election method to vote sincerely. Hence I started studying the
following minimal criterion:
Def. 0-INFO MEAN CONSISTENCY (0IMC).
Under zero information, voting sincerely must maximize expected utility.</pre>
</blockquote>
This sounds like what I've been calling the "No Zero-Information
Strategy" criterion.<br>
<br>
<blockquote type="cite">
<pre wrap="">But unfortunately, it is easy to fail the criterion. Even our beloved
winning votes Condorcet with only 3 candidates <b class="moz-txt-star"><span
class="moz-txt-tag">*</span>fails<span class="moz-txt-tag">*</span></b> it. </pre>
</blockquote>
I knew that the defeat-dropper (winning votes) methods fail this even
with three candidates. But I don't see that as supporting the idea that
meeting the criterion is difficult.<br>
Isn't it met by FPP, IRV, Borda and all the varieties of Borda
Elimination, DSC (assuming the voter has a sincere full ranking) and
others?<br>
(Does random-filling count in your book as "insincere"? What about
truncating in a method that meets Later-no-Help but fails
Later-no-Harm?)<br>
<br>
<blockquote type="cite">
<pre wrap="">So the criterion is already known and has been discussed? Could you give
me a hint what it had been named then? And is it already known that
margins Condorcet fulfills the criterion?</pre>
</blockquote>
Yes is the answer to your last question. <br>
<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://lists.electorama.com/pipermail/election-methods-electorama.com/2000-April/003903.html">http://lists.electorama.com/pipermail/election-methods-electorama.com/2000-April/003903.html</a><br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://lists.electorama.com/pipermail/election-methods-electorama.com/1998-September/002082.html">http://lists.electorama.com/pipermail/election-methods-electorama.com/1998-September/002082.html</a><br>
<br>
Back in September 1998, Blake Cretney wrote this (apparently Winning
Votes was then called "Votes-Against"):<br>
<blockquote type="cite">
<pre>In order to argue in favor of marginal Condorcet, I am going to
suggest a standard that it passes, but Votes-Against fails.
Sincere Expectation Standard
Given that a voter has no knowledge about how others will vote, a
sincere vote must be at least as likely as any insincere vote to
give results that are in some way better in the eyes of the voter.
Or expressed as a more rigid criterion:
-----
Sincere Expectation Criterion (SEC)
Consider a voter with a preference order between the possible
outcomes of the election. Let us call his sincere ballot, X. Now,
assuming that every possible legal ballot is equally likely for every
other voter, there must be some justification for the vote X over any
other way to fill out the ballot, which I will call Y.
This justification is given by the following comparisons:
The probability of X electing one of the voter's first choices vs.
the probability of Y electing one of these choices
The probability of X electing one of the voter's first or second
choices vs. the probability of Y electing one of these.
The probability of X electing one of the voter's first, second or
third choices vs. the probability of Y electing one of these.
... And so on through all the voter's choices
X must either do better in one of these comparisons than Y, or equal
in all. Otherwise the sincere vote can not be justified.</pre>
</blockquote>
<br>
Chris Benham<br>
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