Re: [EM] Why do voters vote?
Terry Bouricius wrote: Perhaps most voters are fundamentally not behaving AS INDIVIDUALS, but as a part of a collective ...in solidarity with a team of fellow citizens (or party members, members of an ethnic group, or whatever). Analysis that focuses on the choices of individuals can miss the social aspect of voting, which may be more fundamental. (I suspect the fundamental reasons must be social. There's a satisfying symmetry to it then, because the higher purpose of voting is definitely social.) Some voters may, however, participate as individuals simply because it gives them a feeling of satisfaction. In Bryan Caplan's book, _The Myth of the Rational Voter: Why Democracies Choose Bad Policies_, he presents a theory of rational irrationality. He argues that voters rationally choose to vote irrationally (in terms of policy), because the psychological satisfaction of voting in line with one's (erroneous) beliefs outweighs the risk of negative outcomes from that action (since each vote has virtually zero impact on the outcome.) Another perspective: consider other modes of rationality aside from instrumental reason. Instrumental reason posits an objective world that is to be manipulated (pulling levers as it were). But social theory also allows for other worlds, including a subjective (inner) world, and an inter-subjective (social) world. These can have their own particular rationalities (none the less rational or reasonable for that). This is a fascinating topic, that makes the debates about methods, or ordinal vs. cardinal voting seem a bit lacking. I agree, it could open doors. Why vote? Consider a linguistic perspective. Voting can be viewed as a form of self-expression, essentially a form of speech. Why speak? Phrased this way, the question leads into language-based social theory, which might be made serviceable for voting. Practical angle: If voting is a form of speech, then maybe it ought to be as free, easy and ubiquitous as the natural forms I agree, or a simple nod of the head directed at an interlocutor. So we could make the *form* of the vote flexible enough to contain the rational *substance* (the particular why) without distorting it. Then the sum of all these high-fidelity votes might amount, in the end, to a substansive democracy. -- Michael Allan Toronto, +1 647-436-4521 http://zelea.com/ Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
[EM] Rivest-Shen optimal voting method, WDS comments
A summary of my comments (I sent them a ton of email but this just summarizes the most important points) can be read here: http://groups.google.com/group/electionsciencefoundation/browse_thread/thread/686c1a4fc3793048 which is thread #945 at the ESF http://groups.google.com/group/electionsciencefoundation -- Warren D. Smith http://RangeVoting.org -- add your endorsement (by clicking endorse as 1st step) and math.temple.edu/~wds/homepage/works.html Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
[EM] Paper by Ron Rivest
This GT method is non-monotonic, which is why we didn't pursue it a few years ago when Jobst reported on the Condorcet Lottery that was based on the pairwise win matrix (i.e. Copeland matrix) in the same way that GT is based on the margins matrix. Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
Re: [EM] How close can we get to the IIAC
- Original Message - From: Kristofer Munsterhjelm Date: Friday, April 16, 2010 10:14 am Subject: Re: [EM] How close can we get to the IIAC To: fsimm...@pcc.edu Cc: election-methods@lists.electorama.com fsimm...@pcc.edu wrote: Schulze's CSSD (Beatpath) method does not satisfy the IIAC, but it does satisfy all of Arrow's other criteria, that is to say all of the reasonable ones plus some others like Clone Independence, Independence from Pareto Dominated Alternatives, etc. We cannot hold the IIAC against Schulze, because no reasonable method satisfies the IIAC. A nitpick: Schulze doesn't satisfy Independence from Pareto- dominated Alternatives. Steve Eppley gives an example on his site: 1: ADECB 5: ADEBC 3: ABDEC 2: BADEC 2: BDECA 6: CBADE 4: CABDE 5: DECAB 2: DBECA D Pareto-dominates E. If E is removed, Schulze elects A, but if not, Schulze elects B. Thanks for the correction. A couple of years ago someone proposed that if adding a candidate changed the winner, the new winner should be either the new candidate or someone that beats the new candidate pairwise. I think Woodall has stated a weak version of IIA, as well. Ah yes, here it is: Weak-IIA. If x is elected, and one adds a new candidate y ahead of x on some of the ballots on which x was first preference (and nowhere else), then either x or y should be elected. Here's a method I proposed a while back that is monotone, clone free, always elects a candidate from the uncovered set, and is independent from candidates that beat the winner, i.e. if a candidate that pairwise beats the winner is removed, the winner still wins: 1. List the candidates in order of decreasing approval. 2. If the approval winner A is uncovered, then A wins. 3. Otherwise, let C1 be the first candidate is the list that covers A. If C1 is uncovered, then C1 wins. 4. Else let C2 be the first candidate in the list that covers C1. If C2 is uncovered, then C2 wins. etc. There are variations on this method that preserve all of the mentioned properties, including methods that do not require approval information, but I think it is nicer to take into account approval information. If this is done via an approval cutoff on ranked ballots, the approval cutoff, AC, itself can be considered a candidate with 50% approval. No candidate with less than 50% approval can cover the AC, and the AC beats pairwise every candidate with less than 50% approval, so no candidate at all can cover the AC unless it pairwise beats all of the candidates with less than 50% approval. What do we do if AC wins the election? If we want a deterministic answer, I suggest that we elect the candidate C that has the least pairwise opposition from the AC. Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
Re: [EM] How close can we get to the IIAC
Hallo, Here's a method I proposed a while back that is monotone, clone free, always elects a candidate from the uncovered set, and is independent from candidates that beat the winner, i.e. if a candidate that pairwise beats the winner is removed, the winner still wins: 1. List the candidates in order of decreasing approval. 2. If the approval winner A is uncovered, then A wins. 3. Otherwise, let C1 be the first candidate is the list that covers A. If C1 is uncovered, then C1 wins. 4. Else let C2 be the first candidate in the list that covers C1. If C2 is uncovered, then C2 wins. etc. Situation 1: Suppose the order of decreasing approval is CDAB. A beats B B beats C C beats D D beats A A beats C B beats D uncovered set: A, B, D. The winner is D. * Situation 2: Suppose some voters rank D higher so that D beats B. Suppose the order of decreasing approval is still CDAB. A beats B B beats C C beats D D beats A A beats C D beats B uncovered set: A, C, D. Now, the winner is C. So, monotonicity is violated. Markus Schulze Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
Re: [EM] How close can we get to the IIAC
Hallo, Here's a method I proposed a while back that is monotone, clone free, always elects a candidate from the uncovered set, and is independent from candidates that beat the winner, i.e. if a candidate that pairwise beats the winner is removed, the winner still wins: 1. List the candidates in order of decreasing approval. 2. If the approval winner A is uncovered, then A wins. 3. Otherwise, let C1 be the first candidate is the list that covers A. If C1 is uncovered, then C1 wins. 4. Else let C2 be the first candidate in the list that covers C1. If C2 is uncovered, then C2 wins. etc. Situation 1: Suppose the order of decreasing approval is CDAB. A beats B B beats C C beats D D beats A A beats C B beats D uncovered set: A, B, D. The winner is D. Situation 3: B beats D. If B is removed, then the uncovered set is: A, C, D. So, if B is removed, then C wins. So, the proposed method doesn't satisfy this property: If a candidate that pairwise beats the winner is removed, the winner still wins. Markus Schulze Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
[EM] IIAC via range-like voting, F.Simmons idea, Dhillon-Mertens?
Dear Forest: check http://www.rangevoting.org/DhillonM.html I was never really able to fully understand this paper. You, having more motivation and/or ability, might be able+wanting to. Then you can explain it to us all. (Note, the paper pdf is linked to the bottom of that web page, so you do not have to go to a library.) It seems to do something like what you were asking for. It proves (or claims to - I'm a bit hesitant to endorse since I never fully understood) that normalized range voting is the unique voting method satisfying a set of Arrow-like criteria, including an IIAC idea quite like yours. -- Warren D. Smith http://RangeVoting.org -- add your endorsement (by clicking endorse as 1st step) and math.temple.edu/~wds/homepage/works.html Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
[EM] Classifying 3-cand scenarios. LNHarm methods again.
Hi, This post is going to ramble a bit but I thought I'd get something out. There are no big conclusions; I'm just explaining where I am at in my mind currently. Here are classifications of three-candidate scenarios as they exist in my head: .'. symmetric - you need a second axis in issue space (beyond left/right) to explain the location of at least one candidate. ... centrist - the third candidate is between the other two. :. clone - the third candidate is a clone of one of the other two. These labels would apply to sincere preferences rather than cast votes (e.g., I could interpret the 49/24/27 scenario as resulting from any of these). The situation I'd like to arrive at is .'. (assuming the candidates aren't staying quite far from the median for some reason). If we can get good preformance arriving at ... then that's pretty good also, but seems like a bit of a waste that we only use one axis. The :. scenario is least promising but good performance there would still be nice if it's the best we can accomplish. As always, I like simple methods and don't really care if they can't realistically support more than three viable candidates. (Unless those candidates aren't going to be good.) The first method I look at fondly is SPST (strongest pair with single transfer). In this method we compare the strongest candidate (in terms of first preferences) with the strongest pair of candidates (in terms of a solid coalition of first/second preferences). If the strongest candidate is also a member of the pair, or has more first preferences than there are votes in the pair's solid coalition, this candidate wins. Otherwise we elim the strongest candidate and transfer his voters' second preferences to one of the pair (if possible). The one of the pair holding the most votes then wins. Alternatively you can just have a second round of voting, and not collect second preferences. In that case the original ballot could be a vote for one and against one ballot, probably requiring a majority of against votes to eliminate the strongest candidate and then assuming that the strongest pair were the 2nd and 3rd place candidates. (I have doubts about nomination strategy going this route. But you could add incentives to stop it from getting out of control.) This is a LNHarm method. I also think that VFA is if it isn't mandatory to vote against a candidate. (VFA is similar to SPST but there is no transfer: If the strongest candidate is disqualified, the second-place candidate is elected. A majority of votes against is required to disqualify. Also incidentally I'm warming to the name Venzke disqualification plurality that Warren came up with, which would leave the term VFA to describe the ballot format.) [Clarification after writing the whole post: If VFA requires you to vote against a candidate, then the voter who doesn't want to do this has to randomly vote against someone, and it is possible that this results in something better than if he picks someone deliberately. I *believe* this is why I didn't in the past claim that VFA satisfied LNHarm.] Also, continuing to digress, I think an iterative, LNHarm-satisfying version of SPST is possible. I'm a little rusty so no promises on that yet. But it would work like this: 1. voters submit a rank ballot truncating wherever they like. 2. compare the frontrunner with the strongest pair as usual in SPST. (So: check that the pair doesn't include the frontrunner, and includes more voters than are currently voting for the frontrunner, and also that some voters are actually still ranking 2+ of the remaining candidates.) 3. if SPST would elect the current leader, ISPST does also, and the method is over. 4. otherwise transfer the current leader's preferences to any remaining candidates (eliminating him) and go back to step 2. It's not completely clear whether the proper complaint is that this favors or disfavors the current leader. Maybe the proper complaint is that the reasoning behind this method isn't very clear. It makes most sense when you really do only have three candidates. In that case IRV and ISPST will both pick a winner from the pair, but ISPST will let the supporters of the strongest candidate transfer their votes to the one of the pair that they like better. [Having written all that I'm feeling doubts that this satisfies LNHarm. It seems like it could be the case that adding a preference creates a strongest pair that is not resolved in your candidate's favor, whereas perhaps your preferred candidate would've won if that pair had been weaker. I won't delete the above though.] There's a tricky thing with elimination methods. We want to eliminate the candidates who can't possibly win and also reveal the votes that we think we want to see. If candidates are bunched together in the center, chances are the first round leader is leading because he sits on the outside and dominates a huge chunk of issue space. If that's true then it's clear we don't want to elect that guy
Re: [EM] Why do voters vote?
This is getting too deep in some ways. I buy Terry's collective and think of the rope in a tug of war. We had an election in my village last month. We do Plurality and have local parties (involving national parties would distract from considering local issues - also, few consider themselves members of these local parties) and 800 voters: I, the ins, would like to continue. C would like to throw all the bums out. There has been much controversy this past year. 4 trustee positions: C won each by a dozen votes. Agreement that I had failed to do well. Mayor (I) reelected by a dozen votes. Agreement, though weak, that he was not to blame for what had happened. Certainly no single voter decided the election, but they did know that a very few, together, staying home or getting out and voting, could have affected which way the rope went. I do not see social above - people are affected by, and care about, how well the village board attends to their needs. When I read of rational irrationality below, I wonder if the real topic may be deciding how to measure and add up conflicting needs and desires. Dave Ketchum. On Apr 17, 2010, at 6:52 AM, Michael Allan wrote: Terry Bouricius wrote: Perhaps most voters are fundamentally not behaving AS INDIVIDUALS, but as a part of a collective ...in solidarity with a team of fellow citizens (or party members, members of an ethnic group, or whatever). Analysis that focuses on the choices of individuals can miss the social aspect of voting, which may be more fundamental. (I suspect the fundamental reasons must be social. There's a satisfying symmetry to it then, because the higher purpose of voting is definitely social.) Some voters may, however, participate as individuals simply because it gives them a feeling of satisfaction. In Bryan Caplan's book, _The Myth of the Rational Voter: Why Democracies Choose Bad Policies_, he presents a theory of rational irrationality. He argues that voters rationally choose to vote irrationally (in terms of policy), because the psychological satisfaction of voting in line with one's (erroneous) beliefs outweighs the risk of negative outcomes from that action (since each vote has virtually zero impact on the outcome.) Another perspective: consider other modes of rationality aside from instrumental reason. Instrumental reason posits yan objective world that is to be manipulated (pulling levers as it were). But social theory also allows for other worlds, including a subjective (inner) world, and an inter-subjective (social) world. These can have their own particular rationalities (none the less rational or reasonable for that). This is a fascinating topic, that makes the debates about methods, or ordinal vs. cardinal voting seem a bit lacking. I agree, it could open doors. Why vote? Consider a linguistic perspective. Voting can be viewed as a form of self-expression, essentially a form of speech. Why speak? Phrased this way, the question leads into language-based social theory, which might be made serviceable for voting. Practical angle: If voting is a form of speech, then maybe it ought to be as free, easy and ubiquitous as the natural forms I agree, or a simple nod of the head directed at an interlocutor. So we could make the *form* of the vote flexible enough to contain the rational *substance* (the particular why) without distorting it. Then the sum of all these high-fidelity votes might amount, in the end, to a substansive democracy. -- Michael Allan Toronto, +1 647-436-4521 http://zelea.com/ Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
Re: [EM] Classifying 3-cand scenarios. LNHarm methods again.
Why IRV? Have we not buried that deep enough? Why not Condorcet which does better with about the same voting? Why TTR? Shouldn't that be avoided if trying for a good method? TTR requires smart deciding as to which candidates to vote on. Will not Condorcet attend to clones with minimum pain? Voters can rank them together (with equal or adjacent ranks). Does not Condorcet properly attend to symmetric with a voted cycle? Dave Ketchum On Apr 17, 2010, at 7:07 PM, Kevin Venzke wrote: Hi, This post is going to ramble a bit but I thought I'd get something out. There are no big conclusions; I'm just explaining where I am at in my mind currently. Here are classifications of three-candidate scenarios as they exist in my head: .'. symmetric - you need a second axis in issue space (beyond left/ right) to explain the location of at least one candidate. ... centrist - the third candidate is between the other two. :. clone - the third candidate is a clone of one of the other two. These labels would apply to sincere preferences rather than cast votes (e.g., I could interpret the 49/24/27 scenario as resulting from any of these). The situation I'd like to arrive at is .'. (assuming the candidates aren't staying quite far from the median for some reason). If we can get good preformance arriving at ... then that's pretty good also, but seems like a bit of a waste that we only use one axis. The :. scenario is least promising but good performance there would still be nice if it's the best we can accomplish. As always, I like simple methods and don't really care if they can't realistically support more than three viable candidates. (Unless those candidates aren't going to be good.) The first method I look at fondly is SPST (strongest pair with single transfer). In this method we compare the strongest candidate (in terms of first preferences) with the strongest pair of candidates (in terms of a solid coalition of first/second preferences). If the strongest candidate is also a member of the pair, or has more first preferences than there are votes in the pair's solid coalition, this candidate wins. Otherwise we elim the strongest candidate and transfer his voters' second preferences to one of the pair (if possible). The one of the pair holding the most votes then wins. Alternatively you can just have a second round of voting, and not collect second preferences. In that case the original ballot could be a vote for one and against one ballot, probably requiring a majority of against votes to eliminate the strongest candidate and then assuming that the strongest pair were the 2nd and 3rd place candidates. (I have doubts about nomination strategy going this route. But you could add incentives to stop it from getting out of control.) This is a LNHarm method. I also think that VFA is if it isn't mandatory to vote against a candidate. (VFA is similar to SPST but there is no transfer: If the strongest candidate is disqualified, the second-place candidate is elected. A majority of votes against is required to disqualify. Also incidentally I'm warming to the name Venzke disqualification plurality that Warren came up with, which would leave the term VFA to describe the ballot format.) [Clarification after writing the whole post: If VFA requires you to vote against a candidate, then the voter who doesn't want to do this has to randomly vote against someone, and it is possible that this results in something better than if he picks someone deliberately. I *believe* this is why I didn't in the past claim that VFA satisfied LNHarm.] Also, continuing to digress, I think an iterative, LNHarm-satisfying version of SPST is possible. I'm a little rusty so no promises on that yet. But it would work like this: 1. voters submit a rank ballot truncating wherever they like. 2. compare the frontrunner with the strongest pair as usual in SPST. (So: check that the pair doesn't include the frontrunner, and includes more voters than are currently voting for the frontrunner, and also that some voters are actually still ranking 2+ of the remaining candidates.) 3. if SPST would elect the current leader, ISPST does also, and the method is over. 4. otherwise transfer the current leader's preferences to any remaining candidates (eliminating him) and go back to step 2. It's not completely clear whether the proper complaint is that this favors or disfavors the current leader. Maybe the proper complaint is that the reasoning behind this method isn't very clear. It makes most sense when you really do only have three candidates. In that case IRV and ISPST will both pick a winner from the pair, but ISPST will let the supporters of the strongest candidate transfer their votes to the one of the pair that they like better. [Having written all that I'm feeling doubts that this satisfies LNHarm. It seems like it could be the case that adding a preference creates a strongest pair
Re: [EM] Classifying 3-cand scenarios. LNHarm methods again.
First, quoting Wikipedia: A Condorcet method is any single-winner election method that meets the Condorcet criterion, that is, which always selects the Condorcet winner, the candidate who would beat each of the other candidates in a run-off election, if such a candidate exists. In modern examples, voters rank candidates in order of preference. There are then multiple, slightly differing methods for calculating the winner, due to the need to resolve circular ambiguities—including the Kemeny- Young method,Ranked Pairs, and the Schulze method. Almost all of these methods give the same result if there are fewer than 4 candidates in the circularly-ambiguous Smith set and voters separately rank all of them. I have heard this complaint before, so am listening for help. WHAT should I say when I want EXACTLY what is described as Condorcet above? Dave Ketchum On Apr 17, 2010, at 9:25 PM, Markus Schulze wrote: Hallo, Dave Ketchum wrote (18 April 2010): Why IRV? Have we not buried that deep enough? Why not Condorcet which does better with about the same voting? Why TTR? Shouldn't that be avoided if trying for a good method? TTR requires smart deciding as to which candidates to vote on. Will not Condorcet attend to clones with minimum pain? Voters can rank them together (with equal or adjacent ranks). Does not Condorcet properly attend to symmetric with a voted cycle? In my opinion, Condorcet refers to a criterion rather than to an election method. Markus Schulze Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
Re: [EM] Classifying 3-cand scenarios. LNHarm methods again.
On Apr 17, 2010, at 9:25 PM, Markus Schulze wrote: In my opinion, Condorcet refers to a criterion rather than to an election method. actually Markus, i mostly disagree. Condorcet, with no other qualification (like Schulze or RP) does not *fully* describe a method because it doesn't specify how it deals with cycles. but cycles don't always happen, and i would bet that they rarely happen in the real world. the ballot evidence in Burlington in 2006 and 2009 show a clear Condorcet ordering of all candidates. but setting aside for the moment the means of dealing with a cycle (or ties), Condorcet *is* a well-defined method that has a ballot definition (Ranked, as opposed to Score or Approval or the Traditional vote-for-one) and a method of tabulation that is consequently different than others of the same ballot such as STV or Borda or Bucklin. it's not a fully defined method, but enough of it *is* defined to make a meaningful comparison with existing methods such as IRV, Plurality, or delayed runoff. i realize that with Schulze or Tideman, the method of tabulation and resolution can take place right from the beginning without doing the generic Condorcet and then applying Schulze or RP in case of a cycle. i realize that. but without worrying about the cycle, there is a method and it is well defined. no disrespect intended, i think the Ranked Ballot is the correct ballot (Score requires too much information from the voter causing voter uncertainty in how to mark the ballot, Approval or Traditional overly limits contingency information from the voter, again causing uncertainty in how to mark the ballot to best support a voter's political interest) and a Condorcet-compliant method is the correct way to tabulate the ballots. and among the Condorcet-compliant methods, Schulze is likely the best, but it is *not* the most transparent for the proletariat and any of these non-traditional methods seems to have a problem getting past some persistent ignorance (which is something we continue to struggle with in politics) among voters. but *which* Condorcet-compliant method (among the ones that are reasonably meaningful) continues to appear to be a bit of ivory- tower academic navel gazing. in my opinion. some are better than others, but it's unlikely to make any difference with any frequency in real elections. just one jaded person's opinion. -- r b-j r...@audioimagination.com Imagination is more important than knowledge. Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
