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Forest Simmons | 1 Apr 2004 01:24
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Re: Approval & CR are 2nd best; Approval STV

On Wed, 31 Mar 2004, [iso-8859-1] Kevin Venzke wrote:

>
> A method I would rank between Condorcet and Approval is AER, or "Approval STV."
> It's IRV, but the elimination order is based on approval.  Because the approval
> counts don't change, and the elimination order is thus fixed from the beginning,
> it's monotonic.  It's intuitive, and gives similar results to WV methods.

What if you recalculated the approval order after each elimination by
making a minimal adjustment to the approval cutoff on each ballot so that
no ballot that still had any candidates ranked would either approve all or
disapprove all candidates?

Would the method still be monotonic?

Forest

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Forest Simmons | 1 Apr 2004 01:29
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Re: Re: non-binding direct democracy system

It looks like Long Beach is a model for where the whole country is headed.

On Fri, 26 Mar 2004, Joe Weinstein wrote:

>
> I don't have much time for most ins and outs on this list (or others), but
> was delighted to read James' stimulatingly-argued detailed proposal for a
> 'non-binding direct democracy system'.
>
> Rather than run to endorse or reject this single proposal (as it stands or
> as it gets amended), I think it would be wise to ask just what objectives it
> would achieve, and - even more important - what objectives it's aimed at,
> and then what our other options may include for realizing them.
>
> In particular, as James indicates, we badly do need more and better citizen
> participation, and James is quite right: it is not fair - and it is also not
> necessary - that citizen opinion should have to be filtered through an
> entrenched oligarchy of a few 'representatives'.
>
> In interests of accuracy and relevance I do take issue with some statements
> made pro or con the proposal.
>
> First, in order to learn where the public stands, there is nothing wrong
> with properly conducted opinion polling.  Potentially tremendous expense and
> bother may be saved, and reasonable and useful accuracy may be achieved.
> It's been done in effect even by the Census Bureau as well as many
> nongovernment organizations.  And, altho contrary to most people's
> intuitions, it's very basic statistical theory that when you are truly
> randomly polling a large population, your accuracy in determining a
> proportion P (namely, of the citizens who prefer YES rather than NO on a
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Kevin Venzke | 1 Apr 2004 03:25
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Re: Approval & CR are 2nd best; Approval STV

Forest,

 --- Forest Simmons <fsimmons <at> pcc.edu> a écrit : 
> > A method I would rank between Condorcet and Approval is AER, or "Approval STV."
> > It's IRV, but the elimination order is based on approval.  Because the approval
> > counts don't change, and the elimination order is thus fixed from the beginning,
> > it's monotonic.  It's intuitive, and gives similar results to WV methods.
> 
> What if you recalculated the approval order after each elimination by
> making a minimal adjustment to the approval cutoff on each ballot so that
> no ballot that still had any candidates ranked would either approve all or
> disapprove all candidates?
> 
> Would the method still be monotonic?

I'd say the answer must be "no," although I'm having trouble thinking of a concrete
example.  In AER, the only effect of raising a winner on some ballots is to
possibly push him back in the elimination order.  But a winner is never eliminated,
and this can't cause any candidate to receive a majority *earlier* than our winner
did, so the winner must still win.

If you raise a winner in the variation you're talking about, you can e.g. cause
some other candidate to receive less approval ("minimal adjustment") and get eliminated 
at an earlier stage.  So the problem is that raising a winner can unpredictably alter the 
order of elimination.  This is a problem of plain IRV, too.

I think only straight Approval can be used to set the order and preserve monotonicity,
because it has the property that "boosting" one candidate can never alter the method's
ranking of the other candidates.
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Dave Ketchum | 1 Apr 2004 03:52

Re: Primaries?

We have about worn out this thread:
      A primary before a ranked ballot general election has its own needs, 
UNLIKE those preceding a Plurality general election.
      Perhaps multiple primary winners would make sense.  If so, needs are 
unlike those of a PR election.
      I like the method to be simple, considering using the same method as 
in the general election qualifying as simple to learn.

On Wed, 31 Mar 2004 15:47:40 -0500 Adam Tarr wrote:

> There's really only one issue left worth discussing in this thread, so 
> I'll cut the rest out:
> 
> Dave Ketchum wrote and I responded, et cetera:
> 
>>>>>>>>      Puzzle:  Assuming the above leads to Condorcet in the 
>>>>>>>> primary, to select two candidates for the general election - WHY 
>>>>>>>> NOT?  the arguments are not necessarily the same as related to 
>>>>>>>> electing two officers for PR.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Not necessarily, sure, but I don't think that Condorcet is 
>>>>>>> clearly the best method to elect two candidates.  It seems likely 
>>>>>>> that it would end up picking two candidates from the center of a 
>>>>>>> party, and nobody from a wing (think Kerry and Edwards, in stead 
>>>>>>> of Kerry and Dean).  But there have been some stabs taken at 
>>>>>>> Condorcet-flavored proportional representation.  The best attempt 
>>>>>>> is probably this one:
>>>>>>> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/election-methods-list/message/10308
>>>>>>> It's pretty complicated, but worth the read.  Try to sell that to
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MIKE OSSIPOFF | 1 Apr 2004 04:02
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RE: Election-methods digest, Vol 1 #573 - 4 msgs


From: election-methods-electorama.com-request <at> electorama.com
Reply-To: election-methods-electorama.com <at> electorama.com
To: election-methods-electorama.com <at> electorama.com
Subject: Election-methods digest, Vol 1 #573 - 4 msgs
Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2004 12:02:40 -0800

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Today's Topics:

    1. Re: Approval  & CR are 2nd best; Approval STV 
(=?iso-8859-1?q?Kevin=20Venzke?=)
    2. RE: IRV - disincentives (James Gilmour)
    3. Re: IRV - disincentives (stephane.rouillon <at> sympatico.ca)
    4. Re: Primaries? (Adam Tarr)
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Bart Ingles | 1 Apr 2004 06:56
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Re: Primaries?


I think the issue with multi-winner primaries is not whether they are
proportional, or even whether the elect clones, but whether they advance
at least one winnable candidate to the general election.  But I suppose
a proportional system would be more likely to do so due to the "shotgun
effect" of advancing dissimilar candidates-- resulting in at least one
electable candidate, along with a few destined to crash and burn.

Bart

Adam Tarr wrote:
> 
> This shouldn't bother us in a single-winner situation, but in the case of a
> multi-winner election it begs the question of why we are even bothering
> with electing more than one nominee, if all we are doing is getting the
> three most similar candidates.
> 
> Moreover, this could constitute really poor strategy.  If the general
> electorate has different preferences than the primary electorate (obviously
> very likely) then producing a slate of candidates with diverse stances is
> more likely to produce a good result for the party, in general.
> 
> Again, none of this argues that perfect PR is needed in a primary.  But
> completely ignoring PR issues is a mistake, too.
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Adam Tarr | 1 Apr 2004 07:24
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Re: Primaries?


>I think the issue with multi-winner primaries is not whether they are
>proportional, or even whether the elect clones, but whether they advance
>at least one winnable candidate to the general election.  But I suppose
>a proportional system would be more likely to do so due to the "shotgun
>effect" of advancing dissimilar candidates-- resulting in at least one
>electable candidate, along with a few destined to crash and burn.

Right, this is exactly what I meant by:

> > Again, none of this argues that perfect PR is needed in a primary.  But
> > completely ignoring PR issues is a mistake, too.

To look at it another way:

>>So, you think it would be acceptable, even desireable, to have three 
>>candidates from a party's centermost faction enter the general election, 
>>even when the party has a broad range of viewpoints?
 > Yes, especially if this faction has the best possibility of winning the 
general election.

If this is what you want, then electing every candidate from the same 
faction is a BAD idea.  Lots of redundancy, no robustness.  That faction 
might be the one with the best shot in the GE, but it might not, too.

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Bart Ingles | 1 Apr 2004 10:25
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Re: Primaries?


Adam Tarr wrote:
> 
> >I think the issue with multi-winner primaries is not whether they are
> >proportional, or even whether the elect clones, but whether they advance
> >at least one winnable candidate to the general election.  But I suppose
> >a proportional system would be more likely to do so due to the "shotgun
> >effect" of advancing dissimilar candidates-- resulting in at least one
> >electable candidate, along with a few destined to crash and burn.
> 
> Right, this is exactly what I meant by:
> 
> > > Again, none of this argues that perfect PR is needed in a primary.  But
> > > completely ignoring PR issues is a mistake, too.
> 
> To look at it another way:
> 
> >>So, you think it would be acceptable, even desireable, to have three
> >>candidates from a party's centermost faction enter the general election,
> >>even when the party has a broad range of viewpoints?
>  > Yes, especially if this faction has the best possibility of winning the
> general election.
> 
> If this is what you want, then electing every candidate from the same
> faction is a BAD idea.  Lots of redundancy, no robustness.  That faction
> might be the one with the best shot in the GE, but it might not, too.

Better than the PR vs. CW dichotomy, assuming you want three nominees,
would be to advance all three from a moderate, electable faction.  If
there is any practical value to nominating multiple candidates, it would
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Rob Speer | 1 Apr 2004 19:23
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Re: Does the 'Independence of Irrelevant Alternatives Criterion' Imply a Condorcet Winner ?

On Tue, Mar 30, 2004 at 05:26:02PM -0300, Marcos C. Ribeiro wrote:
> THE CONCLUSIONS ARE:
> -> If IAA is a false criterion, it doesn't make sense to verify if any method fulfils it. We must be very
secure with the principles from which we start. To verify false criterions is to go in a wrong line of
thought. Simple so. 

What do you mean by "false"? You can say that IIA is a condition that is
_unreasonable_ to satisfy, but there's nothing that can be false about
it. It's just a definition: "If a method has these properties, it is
defined to satisfy IIA."

> -> If the Arrow's theorem depends on the IAA criterion, it is a false "theorem", no matter how famous it is.
(To go ahead, I think we must ignore authority arguments and to have a discussion between equals.)  

Arrow's theorem proves, mathematically, that no voting method can
satisfy non-dictatorship, Pareto-optimality, and IIA. This much is true,
regardless of whether you think IIA is a reasonable criterion.

What you may be calling "false" is the popular paraphrasing of the
theorem as "No voting method is fair". Arrow didn't say that -
pop-science magazines reporting on his theorem did. Specifically, you
can disagree with this paraphrasing because you can disagree that IIA is
necessary for a voting method to be "fair".

The reason that Arrow's theorem is famous is that IIA sounds like a
perfectly reasonable criterion, and it is surprising to find out that
hardly any methods satisfy it. Arrow's theorem explains _why_ hardly any
methods satisfy it (they would either have to be dictatorial or
non-Pareto-optimal).
--

--
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Forest Simmons | 2 Apr 2004 04:15
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Re: Does the 'Independence of Irrelevant Alternatives Criterion' Imply a Condorcet Winner ?

On Thu, 1 Apr 2004, Rob Speer wrote:

> On Tue, Mar 30, 2004 at 05:26:02PM -0300, Marcos C. Ribeiro wrote:
> > THE CONCLUSIONS ARE:
> > -> If IAA is a false criterion, it doesn't make sense to verify if any method fulfils it. We must be very
secure with the principles from which we start. To verify false criterions is to go in a wrong line of
thought. Simple so.
>
> What do you mean by "false"? You can say that IIA is a condition that is
> _unreasonable_ to satisfy, but there's nothing that can be false about
> it. It's just a definition: "If a method has these properties, it is
> defined to satisfy IIA."

I think he just means that no reasonable method can satisfy the criterion
at the level of actual voter preferences.

To make this really simple, suppose that there is only one chooser, and
that there are three choices, and that the chooser prefers A to B to C to
A, with varying levels of intensity.  Suppose that the chooser finally
decides to choose A.  But before announcing her decision she finds out
that option B has been withdrawn.  Is she going to stick with A?

In other words, not even a dictator method can satisfy the IIAC at the
fundamental level of actual preferences.

Of course, the IIAC can be satisfied at the ballot level, as it is by
random ballot, for example.

Forest
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