From: Russ Paielli <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: [EM] Comparative Effectiveness of Approval and Condorcet
in the case of a three candidate cycle.
<snip>
Yes, Approval does have some nice properties under the ideal conditions of DSV, but let me play "devil's advocate" again and bring up some "real-world" concerns.
I've already brought up the issue of inaccurate polling data, and I think the effect of such uncertainty needs to be addressed before the effectiveness of Approval can really be evaluated. Someone somewhere has probably addressed this issue, but I am personally unaware of it.
You are right that disinformation is Approval's Achilles heel. That's why I would recommend ignoring the official polls completely and only rely on previous election results and/or partial results in the current election. If neither of these is available, treat the election as a zero information election. As I have shown this still gives you a two thirds chance of making a favorable (for you) difference if the election is close, and (more importantly) when the next election comes around it will not be zero info.
Beyond that, has anyone considered the optimal "strategy" in responding to a pre-election Approval poll? Since Approval strategy is so dependent on polls, this could be a significant issue. Obviously, people are free to lie to pollsters. Some may consider that unethical, but many will have no such qualms.
So what is the optimal strategy in responding to an Approval poll? Do any or all voters have an incentive to lie about their cutoff point -- or perhaps to even rearrange their preference order before drawing the line? And how would such strategy affect convergence if everyone adopted it? Will honest respondents be at a disadvantage?
Obviously that question is a lot easier to ask than it is to answer, but I think some sort of answer in necessary before Approval can be fully evaluated.
I think that the average person would be apt to play up support for his favorite and down play support for compromise, and that most folks would take this into account when interpreting the polls.
I don't think the problem is with respondents lying so much as with private corporate pollsters having conflicts of interest (to some degree) and (to a much greater degree) corporate news media selectively spinning the results while reporting to the voting public.
Better to start with zero info strategy, and build up data, election by election.
That's where Condorcet has an advantage over Approval: no lag time.
Forest
---- Election-methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
