On Mon, 10 Nov 2008 10:37:35 +0100 Kristofer Munsterhjelm wrote:
Dave Ketchum wrote:
On Sat, 08 Nov 2008 18:45:38 +0100 Kristofer Munsterhjelm wrote:
...
States have differing collections of candidates:
In theory, could demand there be a single national list. More
practical to permit present nomination process, in case states
desire such.
Thus states should be required to prepare their NxN arrays in a
manner that permits exact merging with other NxN arrays, without
having to know what candidates may be in the other arrays.
The easiest way to do this is probably to have the candidates sorted
(by name or some other property, doesn't really matter). When two
matrices with different entries are joined, expand the result matrix
as appropriate. Since the candidate indices are sorted, there'll be
no ambiguity when joining (unless two candidates have the same names,
but that's unlikely).
Two candidates with the same name is a problem to solve regardless of
method.
Sorting could be part of the joining, but I demand the results be
exactly the same as if the ballots had been counted into the final
matrix. Doable, but takes a bit of planning.
A possible tiebreaker for same names would be to prepend (or append) the
state of origin to each candidate name. In case two have the same name
in the same state, the state decides who gets to be "number one" and
"number two". These corner cases would be extremely unlikely, but it
doesn't hurt to specify them.
My point was that this is a problem affecting ANY election method, thus not
needing special attention for Condorcet.
The results should be the same with a plain merge as with a single
count, since a Condorcet matrix entry cm[a][b] just lists how many
voters ranked A > B. Consider voters that couldn't vote on a given
candidate as if they had no effective preference regarding that
candidate. Then, by including the results of some other Condorcet
matrix, if A and B wasn't on that other matrix, cm[a][b] won't change.
Not being sure what you mean by "simple merge", I will repeat my demand.
For example, assume A is a write-in which CANNOT be planned on but must be
adjusted for when counting the ballots. The national NxN array must
include A reflecting proper counts for all votes in the US. True that such
an A is unlikely, but to be expected more if you assume it will never happen.
--
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Dave Ketchum 108 Halstead Ave, Owego, NY 13827-1708 607-687-5026
Do to no one what you would not want done to you.
If you want peace, work for justice.
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