Re: [EM] Anyone got a good analysis on limitations of approval and range voting? (long)
On Nov 10, 2009, at 7:40 AM, Matthew Welland wrote: Also, again, your single vote is irrelevant. except in a close election. It is the aggregate of thousands or millions of votes that will make or break A vs. B. How many feel so strongly against A that they cannot vote for him or her? The binary nature of approval is washed out by large numbers just as a class D amplifier can directly produce smooth analog waveforms out of a pure 1 or 0 signal. the mathematical function that does that is the low-pass filter on the output. it's sorta the same idea that these 1-bit A/D (a.k.a. sigma-delta) converters use. if we were voting with a range ballot, and our continuous range value gets a zero-mean uniform p.d.f. random dither signal added to it (or, to use your PWM example, a zero-mean number drawn sequentially, in chronological order of the vote submission) and that gets quantized to a yes/no Approval vote (i s'pose if the threshold is set to 50%), then you would have a comparable situation. i just dunno if i like the idea of a zero-mean (and even symmetrical p.d.f.) random variable actually going into a governmental election. how well i approve or disapprove of a particular candidate that i am not actively supporting is a function of how i'm feeling on Election Day. but it's less likely how i rank that candidate w.r.t. the other candidates would change. like grading papers, sometimes to come up with a numerical score, we get out our dartboard and see how good our toss is. but students might like a more deterministic method. for governmental elections, i only support a system that is fully deterministic (and repeatable) except, i s'pose, if there is a dead heat, then i s'pose, some kind of drawing of lots would be necessary. it should require enough information from voters that the system knows how any voter would choose between any subset of candidates (the ranked ballot does that, but the approval ballot does not). and it shouldn't force voters to bring their dartboard (or dice or spinner, etc) to the polls to come up with a numerical approval rating for each candidate, because of GIGO. the other principle that is important is that of anonymity of vote. it shouldn't matter if you really, really, really like your candidate and i only tepidly support his/her opponent. my vote for the opponent should count just as much as your more enthusiastic vote for your candidate. there should be nothing that tips the scale in favor of your candidate based on how enthusiastically she is supported, only by the numbers of voters that supports her. our votes should have equal weight. -- r b-j r...@audioimagination.com Imagination is more important than knowledge. Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
Re: [EM] Anyone got a good analysis on limitations of approval and range voting? (long)
In large elections with evenly spread voters and candidates and no strategies the distribution of Approval votes may indeed be such that the best candidate regularly wins. The situation may however be also different. I gave one simple example where the left wing had two candidates and the right wing had only one. The distribution of votes may not bring fair results in this type of set-up. The assumption was that the right wing voters would predominantly approve only their own candidate while many left wing voters would be tempted to indicate which one of the left wing candidates they prefer over the other (despite of clearly preferring both left wing candidates over the right wing candidate). The end result could therefore be biased. The right wing candidate might easily win even if right wing would have considerably smaller than 50% support. With small number of candidates and with a candidate set-up that is not symmetric or well balanced Approval may well produce biased results. Methods that are capable of providing richer information (ranked methods) are likely to provide more balanced input data (and results). Juho On Nov 12, 2009, at 2:28 AM, robert bristow-johnson wrote: On Nov 10, 2009, at 7:40 AM, Matthew Welland wrote: It is the aggregate of thousands or millions of votes that will make or break A vs. B. How many feel so strongly against A that they cannot vote for him or her? The binary nature of approval is washed out by large numbers just as a class D amplifier can directly produce smooth analog waveforms out of a pure 1 or 0 signal. the mathematical function that does that is the low-pass filter on the output. it's sorta the same idea that these 1-bit A/D (a.k.a. sigma-delta) converters use. if we were voting with a range ballot, and our continuous range value gets a zero-mean uniform p.d.f. random dither signal added to it (or, to use your PWM example, a zero-mean number drawn sequentially, in chronological order of the vote submission) and that gets quantized to a yes/no Approval vote (i s'pose if the threshold is set to 50%), then you would have a comparable situation. i just dunno if i like the idea of a zero-mean (and even symmetrical p.d.f.) random variable actually going into a governmental election. how well i approve or disapprove of a particular candidate that i am not actively supporting is a function of how i'm feeling on Election Day. but it's less likely how i rank that candidate w.r.t. the other candidates would change. like grading papers, sometimes to come up with a numerical score, we get out our dartboard and see how good our toss is. but students might like a more deterministic method. for governmental elections, i only support a system that is fully deterministic (and repeatable) except, i s'pose, if there is a dead heat, then i s'pose, some kind of drawing of lots would be necessary. it should require enough information from voters that the system knows how any voter would choose between any subset of candidates (the ranked ballot does that, but the approval ballot does not). and it shouldn't force voters to bring their dartboard (or dice or spinner, etc) to the polls to come up with a numerical approval rating for each candidate, because of GIGO. the other principle that is important is that of anonymity of vote. it shouldn't matter if you really, really, really like your candidate and i only tepidly support his/her opponent. my vote for the opponent should count just as much as your more enthusiastic vote for your candidate. there should be nothing that tips the scale in favor of your candidate based on how enthusiastically she is supported, only by the numbers of voters that supports her. our votes should have equal weight. -- r b-j r...@audioimagination.com Imagination is more important than knowledge. Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
Re: [EM] Anyone got a good analysis on limitations of approval and range voting? (long)
Matthew Welland wrote:
So, to re-frame my question. What is the fatal flaw with approval? I'm
not interested in subtle flaws that result in imperfect results. I'm
interested in flaws that result in big problems such as those we see
with plurality and IRV.
IMHO, it is that you need concurrent polling in order to consistently
elect a good winner. If you don't have polling and thus don't know where
to put the cutoff (between approve and not-approve), you'll face the
Burr dilemma: If you prefer A B C, if you approve both A and B,
you might get B instead of A, but if you approve only A, you might get C!
Thus the kind of Approval that homes in on a good winner employs
feedback. The method is no longer Approval alone, but Approval plus
polling. That /can/ work (people approve {Nader, Gore} if Nader has
fewer votes than Gore, so that Bush doesn't win from the split, but only
approve either Nader or Gore if both are large), but why should we need
to be burdened with the feedback?
Some, like Abd, argue that we always reason based on others' positions
to know how much we can demand, and so that this is a feature rather
than a bug. That doesn't quite sound right to me. In any event, if you
want Approval + bargaining (which the feedback resolves to), make that
claim. Approval alone, without feedback, will be subject to the flaws
mentioned earlier, however.
Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
Re: [EM] Anyone got a good analysis on limitations of approval and range voting? (long)
On Tue, Nov 10, 2009 at 10:37 AM, Kristofer Munsterhjelm km-el...@broadpark.no wrote: IMHO, it is that you need concurrent polling in order to consistently elect a good winner. If you don't have polling and thus don't know where to put the cutoff (between approve and not-approve), you'll face the Burr dilemma: If you prefer A B C, if you approve both A and B, you might get B instead of A, but if you approve only A, you might get C! However, the same logic can be applied to plurality voting. If people had to vote blind, then the results would be even worse. History with plurality has shown that it is reasonable to expect people to know who the top-2 candidates are. Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
Re: [EM] Anyone got a good analysis on limitations of approval and range voting? (long)
On Tuesday 10 November 2009 03:37:56 am Kristofer Munsterhjelm wrote:
Matthew Welland wrote:
So, to re-frame my question. What is the fatal flaw with approval? I'm
not interested in subtle flaws that result in imperfect results. I'm
interested in flaws that result in big problems such as those we see
with plurality and IRV.
IMHO, it is that you need concurrent polling in order to consistently
elect a good winner. If you don't have polling and thus don't know where
to put the cutoff (between approve and not-approve), you'll face the
Burr dilemma: If you prefer A B C, if you approve both A and B,
you might get B instead of A, but if you approve only A, you might get
C!
This seems to me to be a minor, not major, flaw. Having to vote A B to
hedge your bets is not ideal but you might even be able to argue some
benefits to it. A will see B as a serious threat and vice versa. They may
make adjustments to their stands on issues to accommodate voters like you.
Approval voting is enough to bring competition for votes back into the arena
and I think it makes negative campaigning a very risky strategy.
Also, again, your single vote is irrelevant. It is the aggregate of
thousands or millions of votes that will make or break A vs. B. How many
feel so strongly against A that they cannot vote for him or her?
The binary nature of approval is washed out by large numbers just as a class
D amplifier can directly produce smooth analog waveforms out of a pure 1 or 0
signal.
Thus the kind of Approval that homes in on a good winner employs
feedback. The method is no longer Approval alone, but Approval plus
polling. That /can/ work (people approve {Nader, Gore} if Nader has
fewer votes than Gore, so that Bush doesn't win from the split, but only
approve either Nader or Gore if both are large), but why should we need
to be burdened with the feedback?
Sure, in any real election there will be many dynamics at work. Feedback
polls, debates etc. will all improve an election. Approval might benefit from
feedback but I don't see why it becomes fatally flawed without it, only
mildly flawed.
Some, like Abd, argue that we always reason based on others' positions
to know how much we can demand, and so that this is a feature rather
than a bug. That doesn't quite sound right to me. In any event, if you
want Approval + bargaining (which the feedback resolves to), make that
claim. Approval alone, without feedback, will be subject to the flaws
mentioned earlier, however.
Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
