Re: [EM] [RangeVoting] Re: Range Voting As an Issue

[Kevin Venzke]

Hi Jameson,
 
Just passing through at the moment. I read this though and wanted to
comment.

--- En date de : Ven 5.8.11, Jameson Quinn  a écrit :
>In the end, I definitely sympathize with Warren that BR is the best
>measure of results ...

I am finding myself looking at utility less because it doesn't appear
to me that any methods are very good at maximizing it, or differ all 
that much in this respect. In that case perhaps one would do better to
focus on something that methods do differ at, which seems to have a
clear value, instead of fighting for the last tiny scrap of utility in
the odd belief that simulated utility numbers will take anything else
of worth into account! Even if that's theoretically true, we're nowhere
near to possessing such numbers.

>I haven't seen BR results for MJ, but based on its similarity to 
>Range and MCA, I'd suspect MJ clearly beats Condorcet by this measure.

If BR means "shortfall from the best outcome that was possible" then I
want to note, that in 1D simulations, I find all of the Approval-ish
methods to be rather poor. But again, the difference is so small, it 
may not matter.

It is hard to gauge what one "unit of regret" means. In the sims I'm
looking at at the moment, the top method (of over 50) had 25% less
regret than Approval, which was the 3rd worst method. How can I tell if
25% is a lot, and something to be concerned about?

The two methods' rates of electing the utility maximizer were 89% to 
87%. Now it doesn't seem like that much of a difference, does it...?

Kevin Venzke


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Re: [EM] [RangeVoting] Re: Range Voting As an Issue

[Dave Ketchum]

On Aug 5, 2011, at 11:13 PM, Jameson Quinn wrote:

2011/8/5 Dave Ketchum 
On Aug 5, 2011, at 10:22 PM, Jameson Quinn wrote:

2011/8/5 Dave Ketchum 
Brought out for special thought:
rating is easier than ranking. You can express this  
computationally, by saying that ranking requires O(n²) pairwise  
comparisons of candidates (or perhaps for some autistic savants  
who heap-sort in their head, O[n log(n)]), while rating requires  
O(n) comparisons of candidates against an absolute scale. You can  
express it empirically; this has been confirmed by ballot  
spoilage rates, speed, and self-report in study after study.






This somehow does not fit as to rating vs ranking.  I look at A and  
B, doing comparisons as needed, and assign each a value to use:
. For ranking the values can show which exist:  AA>B, and can be used as is unless they need to be converted to  
whatever format may be acceptable.


I'm sorry, I don't understand this sentence.


The ballot counter, seeing A and B each ranked, is going to step a  
count for AB if A is less than B or A is greater than B -  
which difference exists matters but the magnitude of the differences  
is of no interest.


Dave Ketchum

I'm sorry. You're talking about during the counting phase. I was  
talking about the algorithm going on in the voter's head. Assuming  
that "how good is candidate X on this absolute scale?" is an atomic  
operation, and "is X better than Y" is another one.


"good" and "better" are not clear to me.  "How important" fits better  
as the reason the voter is assigning a higher rank.




. For rating the values need to be scaled.

There is no need to scale rating values for MJ. In fact, it is not  
the intention. A vote of "Nader=Poor, Gore=Good, Bush=Fair" is  
perfectly valid and probably fully strategic even on a ballot which  
includes "Unacceptable, Poor, Fair, Good, Excellent".


Thus what needs doing is a trivial bit of extra effort for rating.   
The comparison effort was shared.


"Ballot spoilage rates" also puzzle.  Where can I find what magic  
lets non-Condorcet have less such than Condorcet, for I do not  
believe such magic exists, unless Condorcet is given undeserved  
problems.


Right, I was thinking of strict ranking when I wrote that part.


On Aug 5, 2011, at 8:57 AM, Jameson Quinn wrote:

...




Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info

Re: [EM] [RangeVoting] Re: Range Voting As an Issue

[Jameson Quinn]

2011/8/5 Dave Ketchum 

> On Aug 5, 2011, at 10:22 PM, Jameson Quinn wrote:
>
> 2011/8/5 Dave Ketchum 
>
>> Brought out for special thought:
>>
>> rating is easier than ranking. You can express this computationally, by
>> saying that ranking requires O(n²) pairwise comparisons of candidates (or
>> perhaps for some autistic savants who heap-sort in their head, O[n log(n)]),
>> while rating requires O(n) comparisons of candidates against an absolute
>> scale. You can express it empirically; this has been confirmed by ballot
>> spoilage rates, speed, and self-report in study after study.
>>
>>
>> This somehow does not fit as to rating vs ranking.  I look at A and B,
>> doing comparisons as needed, and assign each a value to use:
>> . For ranking the values can show which exist:  AB, and
>> can be used as is unless they need to be converted to whatever format may be
>> acceptable.
>>
>
> I'm sorry, I don't understand this sentence.
>
>
> The ballot counter, seeing A and B each ranked, is going to step a count
> for AB if A is less than B or A is greater than B - which difference
> exists matters but the magnitude of the differences is of no interest.
>
> Dave Ketchum
>

I'm sorry. You're talking about during the counting phase. I was talking
about the algorithm going on in the voter's head. Assuming that "how good is
candidate X on this absolute scale?" is an atomic operation, and "is X
better than Y" is another one.


>
>
>
>> . For rating the values need to be scaled.
>>
>
> There is no need to scale rating values for MJ. In fact, it is not the
> intention. A vote of "Nader=Poor, Gore=Good, Bush=Fair" is perfectly valid
> and probably fully strategic even on a ballot which includes "Unacceptable,
> Poor, Fair, Good, Excellent".
>
>
>> Thus what needs doing is a trivial bit of extra effort for rating.  The
>> comparison effort was shared.
>>
>> "Ballot spoilage rates" also puzzle.  Where can I find what magic lets
>> non-Condorcet have less such than Condorcet, for I do not believe such magic
>> exists, unless Condorcet is given undeserved problems.
>>
>
> Right, I was thinking of strict ranking when I wrote that part.
>
>
>>
>> On Aug 5, 2011, at 8:57 AM, Jameson Quinn wrote:
>>
> ...
>

Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info

Re: [EM] [RangeVoting] Re: Range Voting As an Issue

[Dave Ketchum]

On Aug 5, 2011, at 10:22 PM, Jameson Quinn wrote:

2011/8/5 Dave Ketchum 
Brought out for special thought:
rating is easier than ranking. You can express this  
computationally, by saying that ranking requires O(n²) pairwise  
comparisons of candidates (or perhaps for some autistic savants  
who heap-sort in their head, O[n log(n)]), while rating requires  
O(n) comparisons of candidates against an absolute scale. You can  
express it empirically; this has been confirmed by ballot spoilage  
rates, speed, and self-report in study after study.






This somehow does not fit as to rating vs ranking.  I look at A and  
B, doing comparisons as needed, and assign each a value to use:
. For ranking the values can show which exist:  AA>B, and can be used as is unless they need to be converted to  
whatever format may be acceptable.


I'm sorry, I don't understand this sentence.


The ballot counter, seeing A and B each ranked, is going to step a  
count for AB if A is less than B or A is greater than B -  
which difference exists matters but the magnitude of the differences  
is of no interest.


Dave Ketchum


. For rating the values need to be scaled.

There is no need to scale rating values for MJ. In fact, it is not  
the intention. A vote of "Nader=Poor, Gore=Good, Bush=Fair" is  
perfectly valid and probably fully strategic even on a ballot which  
includes "Unacceptable, Poor, Fair, Good, Excellent".


Thus what needs doing is a trivial bit of extra effort for rating.   
The comparison effort was shared.


"Ballot spoilage rates" also puzzle.  Where can I find what magic  
lets non-Condorcet have less such than Condorcet, for I do not  
believe such magic exists, unless Condorcet is given undeserved  
problems.


Right, I was thinking of strict ranking when I wrote that part.


On Aug 5, 2011, at 8:57 AM, Jameson Quinn wrote:

...
Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info

Re: [EM] [RangeVoting] Re: Range Voting As an Issue

[Jameson Quinn]

2011/8/5 Dave Ketchum 

> Brought out for special thought:
>
> rating is easier than ranking. You can express this computationally, by
> saying that ranking requires O(n²) pairwise comparisons of candidates (or
> perhaps for some autistic savants who heap-sort in their head, O[n log(n)]),
> while rating requires O(n) comparisons of candidates against an absolute
> scale. You can express it empirically; this has been confirmed by ballot
> spoilage rates, speed, and self-report in study after study.
>
>
> This somehow does not fit as to rating vs ranking.  I look at A and B,
> doing comparisons as needed, and assign each a value to use:
> . For ranking the values can show which exist:  AB, and
> can be used as is unless they need to be converted to whatever format may be
> acceptable.
>

I'm sorry, I don't understand this sentence.


> . For rating the values need to be scaled.
>

There is no need to scale rating values for MJ. In fact, it is not the
intention. A vote of "Nader=Poor, Gore=Good, Bush=Fair" is perfectly valid
and probably fully strategic even on a ballot which includes "Unacceptable,
Poor, Fair, Good, Excellent".


> Thus what needs doing is a trivial bit of extra effort for rating.  The
> comparison effort was shared.
>
> "Ballot spoilage rates" also puzzle.  Where can I find what magic lets
> non-Condorcet have less such than Condorcet, for I do not believe such magic
> exists, unless Condorcet is given undeserved problems.
>

Right, I was thinking of strict ranking when I wrote that part.


>
> On Aug 5, 2011, at 8:57 AM, Jameson Quinn wrote:
>
> If I understand Robert correctly, I think that his concern is to find
> whichever system gets good results, while still leaving the voters' job
> crystal-clear.  In particular, the first priority would be to find a system
> which puts the minimum burden of strategic thinking on the voter. Insofar as
> it's consistent with this first priority, his other priorities are to
> simplify the ballot and to elect a better winner.
>
> He says that he finds Condorcet to beat Range, Approval, IRV, and Plurality
> on those priorities. I can't say I disagree. There is no question that the
> average voter can get away with less strategizing under Condorcet than under
> any of those systems. Range and Approval both give significantly more power
> to a voter who can correctly guess which two candidates are the
> frontrunners; and a conscientious voter simply can't leave it up to the law
> of averages to balance out that power between themself and those crazies on
> the other side. And IRV and Plurality both require lesser-evil thinking and
> favorite betrayal, which is worse.
>
> But I would contend that, just as clearly, both Majority Judgment and SODA
> beat Condorcet by these criteria. These are two very-different systems, so
> I'll tackle them separately.
>
> Why is Majority Judgment easier on the voter than Condorcet? First and
> foremost, because rating is easier than ranking. You can express this
> computationally, by saying that ranking requires O(n²) pairwise comparisons
> of candidates (or perhaps for some autistic savants who heap-sort in their
> head, O[n log(n)]), while rating requires O(n) comparisons of candidates
> against an absolute scale. You can express it empirically; this has been
> confirmed by ballot spoilage rates, speed, and self-report in study after
> study. You can look at the trend of websites - Yelp, IMDB, Amazon, and an
> interminable etc., all use ratings. HotOrNot explicitly experimented with
> FaceMash-style comparisons and found that even a single two-way comparison
> was harder for users than ratings.
>
> Second, MJ has, if anything, less of a strategic incentive than Condorcet.
> Balinski and Laraki found that, in a simulation seeded by real polled
> ballots from the 2007 French presidential election, the MJ result was more
> likely to be stable under strategy than the Condorcet result. Warren Smith
> has argued that, if you know who the two frontrunners are, a Condorcet
> burial strategy is essentially risk-free, while saving cognitive effort. In
> MJ, on the other hand, chances are that your honest vote is already getting
> all possible benefits from such a strategy.
>
> The last two paragraphs may seem counterintuitive to people who are used to
> thinking of ratings ballots in Range terms. That's because, in Range, some
> amount of strategic thinking is almost totally inevitable. It would be
> ridiculous to mark a Range ballot by simply rating each candidate on an
> absolute scale, without normalizing so that you marked at least one max and
> one min vote. And voting power continues to increase as you move towards an
> approval-style ballot. With MJ, on the other hand, even a non-normalized
> vote with no max or min ratings could well have full strategic voting
> power.
>
> As to ballot simplicity, it's partly a matter of taste. I'd say that MJ has
> the edge over Condorcet, but you might disagree. Of course, it woul

Re: [EM] [RangeVoting] Re: Range Voting As an Issue

[Dave Ketchum]

Brought out for special thought:
rating is easier than ranking. You can express this  
computationally, by saying that ranking requires O(n²) pairwise  
comparisons of candidates (or perhaps for some autistic savants who  
heap-sort in their head, O[n log(n)]), while rating requires O(n)  
comparisons of candidates against an absolute scale. You can  
express it empirically; this has been confirmed by ballot spoilage  
rates, speed, and self-report in study after study.


This somehow does not fit as to rating vs ranking.  I look at A and B,  
doing comparisons as needed, and assign each a value to use:
. For ranking the values can show which exist:  AB,  
and can be used as is unless they need to be converted to whatever  
format may be acceptable.

. For rating the values need to be scaled.
Thus what needs doing is a trivial bit of extra effort for rating.   
The comparison effort was shared.


"Ballot spoilage rates" also puzzle.  Where can I find what magic lets  
non-Condorcet have less such than Condorcet, for I do not believe such  
magic exists, unless Condorcet is given undeserved problems.


On Aug 5, 2011, at 8:57 AM, Jameson Quinn wrote:
If I understand Robert correctly, I think that his concern is to  
find whichever system gets good results, while still leaving the  
voters' job crystal-clear.  In particular, the first priority would  
be to find a system which puts the minimum burden of strategic  
thinking on the voter. Insofar as it's consistent with this first  
priority, his other priorities are to simplify the ballot and to  
elect a better winner.


He says that he finds Condorcet to beat Range, Approval, IRV, and  
Plurality on those priorities. I can't say I disagree. There is no  
question that the average voter can get away with less strategizing  
under Condorcet than under any of those systems. Range and Approval  
both give significantly more power to a voter who can correctly  
guess which two candidates are the frontrunners; and a conscientious  
voter simply can't leave it up to the law of averages to balance out  
that power between themself and those crazies on the other side. And  
IRV and Plurality both require lesser-evil thinking and favorite  
betrayal, which is worse.


But I would contend that, just as clearly, both Majority Judgment  
and SODA beat Condorcet by these criteria. These are two very- 
different systems, so I'll tackle them separately.


Why is Majority Judgment easier on the voter than Condorcet? First  
and foremost, because rating is easier than ranking. You can express  
this computationally, by saying that ranking requires O(n²) pairwise  
comparisons of candidates (or perhaps for some autistic savants who  
heap-sort in their head, O[n log(n)]), while rating requires O(n)  
comparisons of candidates against an absolute scale. You can express  
it empirically; this has been confirmed by ballot spoilage rates,  
speed, and self-report in study after study. You can look at the  
trend of websites - Yelp, IMDB, Amazon, and an interminable etc.,  
all use ratings. HotOrNot explicitly experimented with FaceMash- 
style comparisons and found that even a single two-way comparison  
was harder for users than ratings.


Second, MJ has, if anything, less of a strategic incentive than  
Condorcet. Balinski and Laraki found that, in a simulation seeded by  
real polled ballots from the 2007 French presidential election, the  
MJ result was more likely to be stable under strategy than the  
Condorcet result. Warren Smith has argued that, if you know who the  
two frontrunners are, a Condorcet burial strategy is essentially  
risk-free, while saving cognitive effort. In MJ, on the other hand,  
chances are that your honest vote is already getting all possible  
benefits from such a strategy.


The last two paragraphs may seem counterintuitive to people who are  
used to thinking of ratings ballots in Range terms. That's because,  
in Range, some amount of strategic thinking is almost totally  
inevitable. It would be ridiculous to mark a Range ballot by simply  
rating each candidate on an absolute scale, without normalizing so  
that you marked at least one max and one min vote. And voting power  
continues to increase as you move towards an approval-style ballot.  
With MJ, on the other hand, even a non-normalized vote with no max  
or min ratings could well have full strategic voting power.


As to ballot simplicity, it's partly a matter of taste. I'd say that  
MJ has the edge over Condorcet, but you might disagree. Of course,  
it would be possible to do Condorcet with a rated ballot, but since  
I don't know anyone who seriously advocates that, I'm neglecting  
that possibility.


Condorcet can use THE SAME values as rating - the ratings show what is  
needed to identify AB.


For results, I think that MJ and Condorcet both do more than well  
enough. Is it better to have the candidate who makes some majority  
happiest, as in MJ, or the one who ha

Re: [EM] [RangeVoting] Re: Range Voting As an Issue

[Jameson Quinn]

If I understand Robert correctly, I think that his concern is to find
whichever system gets good results, while still leaving the voters' job
crystal-clear.  In particular, the first priority would be to find a system
which puts the minimum burden of strategic thinking on the voter. Insofar as
it's consistent with this first priority, his other priorities are to
simplify the ballot and to elect a better winner.

He says that he finds Condorcet to beat Range, Approval, IRV, and Plurality
on those priorities. I can't say I disagree. There is no question that the
average voter can get away with less strategizing under Condorcet than under
any of those systems. Range and Approval both give significantly more power
to a voter who can correctly guess which two candidates are the
frontrunners; and a conscientious voter simply can't leave it up to the law
of averages to balance out that power between themself and those crazies on
the other side. And IRV and Plurality both require lesser-evil thinking and
favorite betrayal, which is worse.

But I would contend that, just as clearly, both Majority Judgment and SODA
beat Condorcet by these criteria. These are two very-different systems, so
I'll tackle them separately.

Why is Majority Judgment easier on the voter than Condorcet? First and
foremost, because rating is easier than ranking. You can express this
computationally, by saying that ranking requires O(n²) pairwise comparisons
of candidates (or perhaps for some autistic savants who heap-sort in their
head, O[n log(n)]), while rating requires O(n) comparisons of candidates
against an absolute scale. You can express it empirically; this has been
confirmed by ballot spoilage rates, speed, and self-report in study after
study. You can look at the trend of websites - Yelp, IMDB, Amazon, and an
interminable etc., all use ratings. HotOrNot explicitly experimented with
FaceMash-style comparisons and found that even a single two-way comparison
was harder for users than ratings.

Second, MJ has, if anything, less of a strategic incentive than Condorcet.
Balinski and Laraki found that, in a simulation seeded by real polled
ballots from the 2007 French presidential election, the MJ result was more
likely to be stable under strategy than the Condorcet result. Warren Smith
has argued that, if you know who the two frontrunners are, a Condorcet
burial strategy is essentially risk-free, while saving cognitive effort. In
MJ, on the other hand, chances are that your honest vote is already getting
all possible benefits from such a strategy.

The last two paragraphs may seem counterintuitive to people who are used to
thinking of ratings ballots in Range terms. That's because, in Range, some
amount of strategic thinking is almost totally inevitable. It would be
ridiculous to mark a Range ballot by simply rating each candidate on an
absolute scale, without normalizing so that you marked at least one max and
one min vote. And voting power continues to increase as you move towards an
approval-style ballot. With MJ, on the other hand, even a non-normalized
vote with no max or min ratings could well have full strategic voting
power.

As to ballot simplicity, it's partly a matter of taste. I'd say that MJ has
the edge over Condorcet, but you might disagree. Of course, it would be
possible to do Condorcet with a rated ballot, but since I don't know anyone
who seriously advocates that, I'm neglecting that possibility.

For results, I think that MJ and Condorcet both do more than well enough. Is
it better to have the candidate who makes some majority happiest, as in MJ,
or the one who has majorities over all the others, as in Condorcet? On
principle, it's hard to say. In the end, I definitely sympathize with Warren
that BR is the best measure of results (while disagreeing that results
should be the end-all criterion). I haven't seen BR results for MJ, but
based on its similarity to Range and MCA, I'd suspect MJ clearly beats
Condorcet by this measure.

If you want to read more about MJ, the place to start are the papers
on Laraki's
home page . These
are pro-MJ papers, but honestly, I've found that I got more understanding
even of MJ's flaws from reading these critically, than I did from reading
the couple of shoddy anti-MJ papers that you'll find in a Google scholar
search.



As to SODA, the case is also clear. Less need for strategic thinking than
Condorcet? Check. Simpler ballots? In spades. Good results? If voting blocs
tend to be well-defined so that voters agree with their favorite candidates
— not too excessive an assumption in an ideological, partisan election —
then the CW will win in SODA more often than in Condorcet! That is to say,
honesty will be the strategic equilibrium in SODA, and lead to a CW win; but
in Condorcet, strategy could confound this. In practice, I think that the
only case where the CW will not win SODA is when they're an
relatively-unknown centrist. S

Re: [EM] [RangeVoting] Re: Range Voting As an Issue

[robert bristow-johnson]

On Aug 4, 2011, at 3:20 AM, bob wrote:


--- In rangevot...@yahoogroups.com, "thenewthirdparty" 
 wrote:


Guys and Gals,
I now see Range Voting as a very important component to getting 
third parties elected.  But I don't see how the Range Voting group 
will ever change the minds of the public in order for it to be a 
reality.


and they haven't changed my mind about it, even though i'm not opposed 
to election policy reform nor of moving past FPP.  i fully recognize why 
the simple vote-for-one ballot (either FPP or delayed-top-two-runoff) 
disadvantages third-party and independent candidates.


this was a point i brought up during in Burlington IRV debate:  one of 
the vocal opponents to IRV was, 3 years previously, a minor candidate 
for mayor in Burlington Vermont.  i would almost say a non-serious 
candidate, but he got on the ballot (his name is Loyal Ploof).  now he 
lost to the Prog candidate who was elected in 2006 and he was a sorta 
anti-establishment rabble rouser (if he could get a rabble).


now (i told them this), suppose i'm standing in the rabble and Loyal 
says something that we all sorta know but the contending candidates 
aren't gonna bring up and i hear it and i say "yeah, right!  Loyal's 
right!"  maybe even he's a largely single-issue candidate, maybe not.  
but i want to send a message to city hall by voting for Loyal but the 
election between the real contenders might be close and my two-party 
contingency candidate may need my vote.  so Loyal doesn't get it, 
because even if i agree with him and *want* to vote for him, i dare not.


it's the typical Spoiler problem, that discourages voting for 
third-party or independent candidates.  if they can never sufficient 
vote (because the race between credible candidates may be close) third 
parties cannot get off the ground and become contenders.  but i was 
surprized that this guy who would directly benefit from a ranked ballot 
would be opposed to it.  (he didn't like the Prog mayor and essentially 
jumped in the boat with the other Prog-haters that believed, falsely, 
that IRV specifically favored the Progs in Burlington.)


that said, and to repeat that i also understand IRV to have *failed* in 
Burlington in 2009, i am not at all impressed with Range or Score voting 
for governmental elections (for certain Olympic sports, sure, but not 
for governmental elections).  one of the complaints we have against both 
FPP and IRV (as we found out in Burlington in 2009) is placing obvious 
burdens of tactical voting on the electorate.  we don't *like* having to 
forsake our favorite candidate in order to accomplish some other 
political imperative.  FPP discourages the Nader voters from voting for 
their favorite candidate in 2000 by punishing them when it became clear 
that their vote cause Bush to be elected.  and IRV discourages the GOP 
Prog-haters in Burlington from voting for their favorite candidate in 
2009 when they discover that marking their favorite as #1 on the ballot 
actually caused the Prog to win.


now, it's not the ranked ballot that failed these voters, it was the 
Hare-STV method of tabulating the vote. Condorcet would have taken the 
same ballot data and elected the candidate that was preferred by the 
electorate over any other specific candidate.  The GOP who lost the most 
in the election would neither have gotten punished for their sincere 
1st-choice vote (if IRV had survived, in 2012 these guys would be saying 
to themselves in the polls: "I gotta choose between Liberal and 
More-Liberal, because if I vote for the guy I really like, More-Liberal 
gets elected"), they would have been more satisfied with the Condorcet 
winner than with the IRV winner, who was their least favorite.  And the 
Progs would have been more satisfied with the Condorcet winner than with 
the apparent FPP winner (the GOP), but they would be unhappy with the 
result due to rivalry the Progs and Dems have for the common liberal 
voter in this town.


Ranked-choice voting requires less strategizing by the voter than Range 
because it requires less information.  with a ranked ballot, all the 
voter needs to decide is who, in every contingency that matters to the 
voter, who he or she would vote for.  they don't need to decide how much 
*more* they like Mother Teresa over Ghandi.  If they really want to bury 
a third candidate, Stalin, they have to sacrifice their preference 
between the two virtuous and the election might be decided between 
them.  Or maybe the election will turn out to be a battle between Stalin 
and Satan and they might rather live under Stalin than Satan, so they 
want to bump him up a little (leave Satan with a score of 0).  but what 
if Satan wins because not enough voters scored Stalin up enough?  or 
what if either Teresa or Ghandi lose to Stalin because too many voters 
scored Stalin too high (for fear of electing Satan)?


what to do?  what to do?

but a ranked ballot is easy:

  Teresa > Ghandi > Stalin > Satan

Re: [EM] [RangeVoting] Re: Range Voting As an Issue

[Dave Ketchum]

Here I talk of moving up from FPP to Range or Condorcet.  I do not get  
into other single-winner elections or into multi-winner elections -  
while such deserve considering, they distract from my primary goal,  
which is to promote moving upward without getting buried in details.


Voters should see advantages in moving up to a better method.

To vote for one, as in FPP:
. In Range, assign your choice a maximum rating.
. In Condorcet, simply rank your choice.

Voting for two is using more power than FPP offers.  Often there is a  
major pair of candidates for which you prefer one, and one other that  
you also want to vote for:  For your second choice you could give the  
same rank or rating, or lower:
. In Range you assign first choice maximum rating.  Unrated share  
minimum.  The farther you rate second below max, the stronger your  
vote for max over second.  BUT, the nearer you rate second to unrated,  
the weaker you rate second over unrated.

. In Condorcet, rank your first choice higher than your second.

Voting for more is doable:
. In Range your difference in rating between any two is how much  
you prefer the higher over the lower, and the sum of these differences  
decides which wins their race.

. In Condorcet they count how many rank A>B vs how many rank B>A.

Politicians may hesitate in moving up to more powerful methods.  Range  
or Condorcet can cost more, but getting a truer reading as to voter  
choices can be worth the pain.


Dave Ketchum

On Aug 4, 2011, at 3:20 AM, bob wrote:


--- In rangevot...@yahoogroups.com, "thenewthirdparty"  
 wrote:


Guys and Gals,
I now see Range Voting as a very important component to getting  
third parties elected.  But I don't see how the Range Voting group  
will ever change the minds of the public in order for it to be a  
reality.  Does someone have thoughts on how to get your Range  
Voting plan voted into action?  I would like to hear how Range  
Voting moves beyond more than just a good idea.




I think we need to start a PAC or even maybe a party that has the  
sole objective of getting rid of plurality voting.  We need to be  
able to communicate that competitive elections in which there is no  
vote splitting is the most important thing we can do to hold  
politicians accountable.  We also need to be willing to vote for  
candidates who support getting rid of plurality regardless of what  
other positions that candidate holds. We need to communicate that  
once we get over this hump, we will no longer have to worry about  
having to vote for the lesser of two evils ever again.


Another thing we can do is email and tweet news hosts like Rachael  
Maddow and ask them to do a segment on different voting systems.  If  
we organize to tweet pundits at the same time, maybe they'll get the  
message.





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