MO
Michael Ossipoff
Wed, Nov 16, 2016 1:19 AM
When I started my current EM participation, I was saying that 3-Slot ICT
was my favorite method.
That doesn't conflict with saying that I consider Approval the best,
because I regard 3-Slot ICT, or unlimited-rankings ICT (when used
approval-like) as an Approval version without chicken-dilemma.
Later I realized that MDDTR is better than ICT, because it gives better
protection to middle candidates.
I measure that protection by how well they'd be protected if they were
CWs. ...what it would take to protect their win, and how well it's
protected.
I define "middle candidates" as candidates you rank or rate below top and
above bottom.
ICT gives no protection to middle candidates, against burial, or even
against innocent, non-strategic truncation--the two things that threaten a
CWs in pairwise-c0unt methods.
MDDTR gives full truncation-proofness to middle candidates, but (contrary
to what I earlier believed), its protection of middle candidates against
burial can only be called "shabby".
By the way, I no longer think that ICT or MDDTR needs to be 3-slot. 3-Slot
would be fine with me, because I believe that ICT or MDDTR should be used
as Approval, and that middle rating or ranking should only be used when
seriously needed to deter chicken-dilemma defection. When middle is used in
an unlimited-ranking MDDTR or ICT, it should probably consist of 2nd-place
ranking, if you want to give the demoted candidates the best protection.
...but maybe you'd rather rank them with respect to eachother, at different
middle levels, as I probably sometimes would.
But, as I've been saying, activists & organizations seem to like rankings,
and some people--overcompromisers & rival parties--might very well need
rankings to soften their voting errors.
And it seems to me that there's no particular reason not to rank, in order
of preference, your middle candidates, if some of them are better than
others, or if the voters of some of them are less trustworthy than others.
So, that's if you want CD, in addition to FBC, and good protection for
middle candidates
Even if you're using the method as Approval, you still want your demoted
candidate(s) to be well protected. Just because you don't trust hir voters
doesn't mean you want to throw her to the hounds and thereby lower Pt, the
probability of electing from your strong top-set.
Anyway, so far, this is all referring to CD methods.
Of those, I like MDDTR best. As a rank method, it (as i said) gives only
shabby burial-protection to a middle candidate. But evidently (please tell
me it isn't so) you can't have FBC, CD, and good protection of middle
candidates.
I consider CD more important to how well protected middle candidates are.
Yes, FBC + CD give poor protection to middle candidates, and that lessens
the value of their CD. But non-CD methods don't have CD at all, and that's
worse.
So I prefer MDDTR to methods that give better protection to middle
candidates, but don't have CD.
So, where I used to say that my favorite method is 3-Slot ICT, now I say
that my favorite method is MDDTR. Preferably with unlimited rankings.
(Though one could use only the 1st, 2nd, & bottom positions if one chose
to). ...regardable as a chicken-dilemma-free version of Approval.
Non-CD methods with better "middle-strategy" than CD methods:
But, in an election, I'm just one voter, and so, how well-suited the method
is to me is less important, and won't affect the outcome as much, in
comparison to how well-suited the method is to lots of progressives.
So, what if most progressives would rather have a method that's really good
as a rank method, a method that has good "middle strategy" (strategy for
protecting a middle candidate's win if s/he's CWs).
That would be important if you knew that all or nearly all, or even most of
them were going to use the method purely as a rank method.
Bucklin is the traditional FBC rankings-method.
I distinguish 2 kinds of middle strategy merit:
-
How well the method protects top-ranked candidates against middle-ranked
candidates. I call that "Middle1"
-
How well the lmethod protects a middle-ranked candidate against any
candidate you rank lower than hir. I call that "Middle2".
So, how to get the best middle strategy, with the main goal still being
keeping a good probability, Pt, of electing from your strong top-set?
MDDTR's middle1 seems better than that of Bucklin. In MDDTR, you're voting
to contribute to a majority for your top against your middle. In Bucklin,
you can protect top against middle by skipping some rating-levels above the
middle candidates. In that way, you can give the top candidates time to
receive the coalescing lower-choice votes that they'll get from the
preferrers of other candidates, before giving anything to the middle
candidates.
That's a bit more work than just ranking in order of preference. It
requires you to judge where, and how far down in rankings, your top
candidates are going to receive lower-choice votes from.
So I suggest that MDDTR does better at Middle1 than Bucklin does.
But Bucklin does better at Middle2.
In Bucklin, the CWs's win is protected by the people who pretty-much agree
with you, the people of your wing, merely not ranking down too far.
MDDTR needs that too, but it isn't enough to give MDDTR more than shabby
protection.
...And Bucklin's Middle1, though not as convenient or easy as that of
MDDTR, isn't as questionable as MDDTR's Middle2.
So, overall, I'd say that Bucklin's Middle Strategy is better than that of
MDDTR. So, for people who want to use the method purely as a rank-method,
Bucklin is better than MDDTR.
Bucklin also has the advantage of use-precedent. MDDT has the advantage of
precinct-summability,but I don't consider that essential.
For voters using the method purely as a rank method, I'd prefer Bucklin to
MDDTR.
Chicken dilemma won't happen all the time, probably won't happen often. But
middle-protection will always matter to people using it as a rank method.
But it seems to me that, once we give up CD (for voters who need good
middle strategly, because of their rank voting), then it might be possible
to do better than Bucklin.
It seems to me that methods that use both Approval and pairwise-count can
do better than Bucklin, at middle protection.
A lot of methods of that kind have been proposed, and I've ignored all of
them because they don't meet CD. But, as mentioned above, for some
electorates, middle strategy could be more important.
It seems to me that MDDA (also evidently named MPOA) and Smith//Approval
are two methods that might be better than Bucklin at middle protection..
Using Approval as the cycle-solution is a very powerful idea (if you're
willing to give up CD, for an electorate's needs). But most of you already
knew that, before I paid attention to it (...because I was only looking at
CD methods)..
MDDA's & Smith//Approval's burial vulnerability doesn't matter much, when
the Approval winner wins the cycle. In fact, Smith//Approval's
truncation-vulnerability could even be regarded as an advantage, for when
your strong top-set doesn't include the CWs.
MDDA & Smith//Approval look better to me than Bucklin.
Simpler Middle1.
Precinct-Summability is an added bonus.
MDDA seems to have a briefer definition than either Bucklin or
Smith//Approval, and brief definition can be decisive.
I know of Bucklin being rejected when MDDTR was accepted. MDDA would almost
surely have been accepted too.
I don't think Smith//Approval would go over well, with its need to define
the Smith set, which greatly lengthens the definition.
For an electorate that need good Middle1 & Middle2 more than CD, MDDA seems
the winner so far.
Smith//Approvsl of course meets Smith. ...which of course means that it
fails FBC. But does it need FBC?
It could be argued (but I don't know if it's true) that Smith//Approval
doesn't need FBC, because, though you don't have an efffective Approval
vote at the top, you still can vote Approval, with the approval-cutoff, or
by only ranking your strong top-set.
So, though Compromise could become pair-beaten by Favorite because you
raise Favorite to top with Compromise, resulting in a cycle instead of a
CWv win for Favorite, the cycle will be judged by approvals, and you're
approved only your strong top-set.
Of course, just because Favorite was almost the CWv doesn't necessarily
mean that s/he'll win the Approval count. But are you any worse off than
you'd have been with MDDA?
Forest (but maybe others too) has proposed a number of methods that combine
pairwise-count and Approval. Do any of those beat MDDA & Smith//Approval by
the standards of protecting one's strong top-set, and Middle1 & Middle2?
in particular, do any of them do better than MDDA by those standards? Do
any do as well as MDDA by those standards and have as brief a defintion, or
nearly as brief a definition?
In other words, are there methods that achieve those things better than
MDDA & Smith//Approval, or achieve them better than MDDA and have as brief
a definition?
In fact, is there a method that meets FBC (or doesn't need it), meets CD,
and does as well by Middle1 & Middle2 as MDDA, Smith//Approval or Bucklin?
Michael Ossipoff
When I started my current EM participation, I was saying that 3-Slot ICT
was my favorite method.
That doesn't conflict with saying that I consider Approval the best,
because I regard 3-Slot ICT, or unlimited-rankings ICT (when used
approval-like) as an Approval version without chicken-dilemma.
Later I realized that MDDTR is better than ICT, because it gives better
protection to middle candidates.
I measure that protection by how well they'd be protected if they were
CWs. ...what it would take to protect their win, and how well it's
protected.
I define "middle candidates" as candidates you rank or rate below top and
above bottom.
ICT gives no protection to middle candidates, against burial, or even
against innocent, non-strategic truncation--the two things that threaten a
CWs in pairwise-c0unt methods.
MDDTR gives full truncation-proofness to middle candidates, but (contrary
to what I earlier believed), its protection of middle candidates against
burial can only be called "shabby".
By the way, I no longer think that ICT or MDDTR needs to be 3-slot. 3-Slot
would be fine with me, because I believe that ICT or MDDTR should be used
as Approval, and that middle rating or ranking should only be used when
seriously needed to deter chicken-dilemma defection. When middle is used in
an unlimited-ranking MDDTR or ICT, it should probably consist of 2nd-place
ranking, if you want to give the demoted candidates the best protection.
...but maybe you'd rather rank them with respect to eachother, at different
middle levels, as I probably sometimes would.
But, as I've been saying, activists & organizations seem to like rankings,
and some people--overcompromisers & rival parties--might very well need
rankings to soften their voting errors.
And it seems to me that there's no particular reason not to rank, in order
of preference, your middle candidates, if some of them are better than
others, or if the voters of some of them are less trustworthy than others.
So, that's if you want CD, in addition to FBC, and good protection for
middle candidates
Even if you're using the method as Approval, you still want your demoted
candidate(s) to be well protected. Just because you don't trust hir voters
doesn't mean you want to throw her to the hounds and thereby lower Pt, the
probability of electing from your strong top-set.
Anyway, so far, this is all referring to CD methods.
Of those, I like MDDTR best. As a rank method, it (as i said) gives only
shabby burial-protection to a middle candidate. But evidently (please tell
me it isn't so) you can't have FBC, CD, and good protection of middle
candidates.
I consider CD more important to how well protected middle candidates are.
Yes, FBC + CD give poor protection to middle candidates, and that lessens
the value of their CD. But non-CD methods don't have CD at all, and that's
worse.
So I prefer MDDTR to methods that give better protection to middle
candidates, but don't have CD.
So, where I used to say that my favorite method is 3-Slot ICT, now I say
that my favorite method is MDDTR. Preferably with unlimited rankings.
(Though one could use only the 1st, 2nd, & bottom positions if one chose
to). ...regardable as a chicken-dilemma-free version of Approval.
------------------------------------------------------------------
Non-CD methods with better "middle-strategy" than CD methods:
But, in an election, I'm just one voter, and so, how well-suited the method
is to me is less important, and won't affect the outcome as much, in
comparison to how well-suited the method is to lots of progressives.
So, what if most progressives would rather have a method that's really good
as a rank method, a method that has good "middle strategy" (strategy for
protecting a middle candidate's win if s/he's CWs).
That would be important if you knew that all or nearly all, or even most of
them were going to use the method purely as a rank method.
Bucklin is the traditional FBC rankings-method.
I distinguish 2 kinds of middle strategy merit:
1. How well the method protects top-ranked candidates against middle-ranked
candidates. I call that "Middle1"
2. How well the lmethod protects a middle-ranked candidate against any
candidate you rank lower than hir. I call that "Middle2".
So, how to get the best middle strategy, with the main goal still being
keeping a good probability, Pt, of electing from your strong top-set?
MDDTR's middle1 seems better than that of Bucklin. In MDDTR, you're voting
to contribute to a majority for your top against your middle. In Bucklin,
you can protect top against middle by skipping some rating-levels above the
middle candidates. In that way, you can give the top candidates time to
receive the coalescing lower-choice votes that they'll get from the
preferrers of other candidates, before giving anything to the middle
candidates.
That's a bit more work than just ranking in order of preference. It
requires you to judge where, and how far down in rankings, your top
candidates are going to receive lower-choice votes from.
So I suggest that MDDTR does better at Middle1 than Bucklin does.
But Bucklin does better at Middle2.
In Bucklin, the CWs's win is protected by the people who pretty-much agree
with you, the people of your wing, merely not ranking down too far.
MDDTR needs that too, but it isn't enough to give MDDTR more than shabby
protection.
...And Bucklin's Middle1, though not as convenient or easy as that of
MDDTR, isn't as questionable as MDDTR's Middle2.
So, overall, I'd say that Bucklin's Middle Strategy is better than that of
MDDTR. So, for people who want to use the method purely as a rank-method,
Bucklin is better than MDDTR.
Bucklin also has the advantage of use-precedent. MDDT has the advantage of
precinct-summability,but I don't consider that essential.
For voters using the method purely as a rank method, I'd prefer Bucklin to
MDDTR.
Chicken dilemma won't happen all the time, probably won't happen often. But
middle-protection will always matter to people using it as a rank method.
But it seems to me that, once we give up CD (for voters who need good
middle strategly, because of their rank voting), then it might be possible
to do better than Bucklin.
It seems to me that methods that use both Approval and pairwise-count can
do better than Bucklin, at middle protection.
A lot of methods of that kind have been proposed, and I've ignored all of
them because they don't meet CD. But, as mentioned above, for some
electorates, middle strategy could be more important.
It seems to me that MDDA (also evidently named MPOA) and Smith//Approval
are two methods that might be better than Bucklin at middle protection..
Using Approval as the cycle-solution is a very powerful idea (if you're
willing to give up CD, for an electorate's needs). But most of you already
knew that, before I paid attention to it (...because I was only looking at
CD methods)..
MDDA's & Smith//Approval's burial vulnerability doesn't matter much, when
the Approval winner wins the cycle. In fact, Smith//Approval's
truncation-vulnerability could even be regarded as an advantage, for when
your strong top-set doesn't include the CWs.
MDDA & Smith//Approval look better to me than Bucklin.
Simpler Middle1.
Precinct-Summability is an added bonus.
MDDA seems to have a briefer definition than either Bucklin or
Smith//Approval, and brief definition can be decisive.
I know of Bucklin being rejected when MDDTR was accepted. MDDA would almost
surely have been accepted too.
I don't think Smith//Approval would go over well, with its need to define
the Smith set, which greatly lengthens the definition.
For an electorate that need good Middle1 & Middle2 more than CD, MDDA seems
the winner so far.
Smith//Approvsl of course meets Smith. ...which of course means that it
fails FBC. But does it need FBC?
It could be argued (but I don't know if it's true) that Smith//Approval
doesn't need FBC, because, though you don't have an efffective Approval
vote at the top, you still can vote Approval, with the approval-cutoff, or
by only ranking your strong top-set.
So, though Compromise could become pair-beaten by Favorite because you
raise Favorite to top with Compromise, resulting in a cycle instead of a
CWv win for Favorite, the cycle will be judged by approvals, and you're
approved only your strong top-set.
Of course, just because Favorite was almost the CWv doesn't necessarily
mean that s/he'll win the Approval count. But are you any worse off than
you'd have been with MDDA?
Forest (but maybe others too) has proposed a number of methods that combine
pairwise-count and Approval. Do any of those beat MDDA & Smith//Approval by
the standards of protecting one's strong top-set, and Middle1 & Middle2?
in particular, do any of them do better than MDDA by those standards? Do
any do as well as MDDA by those standards and have as brief a defintion, or
nearly as brief a definition?
In other words, are there methods that achieve those things better than
MDDA & Smith//Approval, or achieve them better than MDDA and have as brief
a definition?
In fact, is there a method that meets FBC (or doesn't need it), meets CD,
and does as well by Middle1 & Middle2 as MDDA, Smith//Approval or Bucklin?
Michael Ossipoff
FS
Forest Simmons
Wed, Nov 16, 2016 10:30 PM
Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without having
to mention the Smith set:
List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate higher in
the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order adjacent members.
When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate at
the top of the list.
Note that the winner will automatically be a member of the top cycle, and
if it is a cycle of three, it will be the most approved member of the cycle.
Also notice that it yields an unambiguous social order, and that there can
be no second place complaint.
On Tue, Nov 15, 2016 at 5:19 PM, Michael Ossipoff email9648742@gmail.com
wrote:
When I started my current EM participation, I was saying that 3-Slot ICT
was my favorite method.
That doesn't conflict with saying that I consider Approval the best,
because I regard 3-Slot ICT, or unlimited-rankings ICT (when used
approval-like) as an Approval version without chicken-dilemma.
Later I realized that MDDTR is better than ICT, because it gives better
protection to middle candidates.
I measure that protection by how well they'd be protected if they were
CWs. ...what it would take to protect their win, and how well it's
protected.
I define "middle candidates" as candidates you rank or rate below top and
above bottom.
ICT gives no protection to middle candidates, against burial, or even
against innocent, non-strategic truncation--the two things that threaten a
CWs in pairwise-c0unt methods.
MDDTR gives full truncation-proofness to middle candidates, but (contrary
to what I earlier believed), its protection of middle candidates against
burial can only be called "shabby".
By the way, I no longer think that ICT or MDDTR needs to be 3-slot. 3-Slot
would be fine with me, because I believe that ICT or MDDTR should be used
as Approval, and that middle rating or ranking should only be used when
seriously needed to deter chicken-dilemma defection. When middle is used in
an unlimited-ranking MDDTR or ICT, it should probably consist of 2nd-place
ranking, if you want to give the demoted candidates the best protection.
...but maybe you'd rather rank them with respect to eachother, at different
middle levels, as I probably sometimes would.
But, as I've been saying, activists & organizations seem to like rankings,
and some people--overcompromisers & rival parties--might very well need
rankings to soften their voting errors.
And it seems to me that there's no particular reason not to rank, in order
of preference, your middle candidates, if some of them are better than
others, or if the voters of some of them are less trustworthy than others.
So, that's if you want CD, in addition to FBC, and good protection for
middle candidates
Even if you're using the method as Approval, you still want your demoted
candidate(s) to be well protected. Just because you don't trust hir voters
doesn't mean you want to throw her to the hounds and thereby lower Pt, the
probability of electing from your strong top-set.
Anyway, so far, this is all referring to CD methods.
Of those, I like MDDTR best. As a rank method, it (as i said) gives only
shabby burial-protection to a middle candidate. But evidently (please tell
me it isn't so) you can't have FBC, CD, and good protection of middle
candidates.
I consider CD more important to how well protected middle candidates are.
Yes, FBC + CD give poor protection to middle candidates, and that lessens
the value of their CD. But non-CD methods don't have CD at all, and that's
worse.
So I prefer MDDTR to methods that give better protection to middle
candidates, but don't have CD.
So, where I used to say that my favorite method is 3-Slot ICT, now I say
that my favorite method is MDDTR. Preferably with unlimited rankings.
(Though one could use only the 1st, 2nd, & bottom positions if one chose
to). ...regardable as a chicken-dilemma-free version of Approval.
Non-CD methods with better "middle-strategy" than CD methods:
But, in an election, I'm just one voter, and so, how well-suited the
method is to me is less important, and won't affect the outcome as much, in
comparison to how well-suited the method is to lots of progressives.
So, what if most progressives would rather have a method that's really
good as a rank method, a method that has good "middle strategy" (strategy
for protecting a middle candidate's win if s/he's CWs).
That would be important if you knew that all or nearly all, or even most
of them were going to use the method purely as a rank method.
Bucklin is the traditional FBC rankings-method.
I distinguish 2 kinds of middle strategy merit:
-
How well the method protects top-ranked candidates against
middle-ranked candidates. I call that "Middle1"
-
How well the lmethod protects a middle-ranked candidate against any
candidate you rank lower than hir. I call that "Middle2".
So, how to get the best middle strategy, with the main goal still being
keeping a good probability, Pt, of electing from your strong top-set?
MDDTR's middle1 seems better than that of Bucklin. In MDDTR, you're voting
to contribute to a majority for your top against your middle. In Bucklin,
you can protect top against middle by skipping some rating-levels above the
middle candidates. In that way, you can give the top candidates time to
receive the coalescing lower-choice votes that they'll get from the
preferrers of other candidates, before giving anything to the middle
candidates.
That's a bit more work than just ranking in order of preference. It
requires you to judge where, and how far down in rankings, your top
candidates are going to receive lower-choice votes from.
So I suggest that MDDTR does better at Middle1 than Bucklin does.
But Bucklin does better at Middle2.
In Bucklin, the CWs's win is protected by the people who pretty-much agree
with you, the people of your wing, merely not ranking down too far.
MDDTR needs that too, but it isn't enough to give MDDTR more than shabby
protection.
...And Bucklin's Middle1, though not as convenient or easy as that of
MDDTR, isn't as questionable as MDDTR's Middle2.
So, overall, I'd say that Bucklin's Middle Strategy is better than that of
MDDTR. So, for people who want to use the method purely as a rank-method,
Bucklin is better than MDDTR.
Bucklin also has the advantage of use-precedent. MDDT has the advantage
of precinct-summability,but I don't consider that essential.
For voters using the method purely as a rank method, I'd prefer Bucklin to
MDDTR.
Chicken dilemma won't happen all the time, probably won't happen often.
But middle-protection will always matter to people using it as a rank
method.
But it seems to me that, once we give up CD (for voters who need good
middle strategly, because of their rank voting), then it might be possible
to do better than Bucklin.
It seems to me that methods that use both Approval and pairwise-count can
do better than Bucklin, at middle protection.
A lot of methods of that kind have been proposed, and I've ignored all of
them because they don't meet CD. But, as mentioned above, for some
electorates, middle strategy could be more important.
It seems to me that MDDA (also evidently named MPOA) and Smith//Approval
are two methods that might be better than Bucklin at middle protection..
Using Approval as the cycle-solution is a very powerful idea (if you're
willing to give up CD, for an electorate's needs). But most of you already
knew that, before I paid attention to it (...because I was only looking at
CD methods)..
MDDA's & Smith//Approval's burial vulnerability doesn't matter much, when
the Approval winner wins the cycle. In fact, Smith//Approval's
truncation-vulnerability could even be regarded as an advantage, for when
your strong top-set doesn't include the CWs.
MDDA & Smith//Approval look better to me than Bucklin.
Simpler Middle1.
Precinct-Summability is an added bonus.
MDDA seems to have a briefer definition than either Bucklin or
Smith//Approval, and brief definition can be decisive.
I know of Bucklin being rejected when MDDTR was accepted. MDDA would
almost surely have been accepted too.
I don't think Smith//Approval would go over well, with its need to define
the Smith set, which greatly lengthens the definition.
For an electorate that need good Middle1 & Middle2 more than CD, MDDA
seems the winner so far.
Smith//Approvsl of course meets Smith. ...which of course means that it
fails FBC. But does it need FBC?
It could be argued (but I don't know if it's true) that Smith//Approval
doesn't need FBC, because, though you don't have an efffective Approval
vote at the top, you still can vote Approval, with the approval-cutoff, or
by only ranking your strong top-set.
So, though Compromise could become pair-beaten by Favorite because you
raise Favorite to top with Compromise, resulting in a cycle instead of a
CWv win for Favorite, the cycle will be judged by approvals, and you're
approved only your strong top-set.
Of course, just because Favorite was almost the CWv doesn't necessarily
mean that s/he'll win the Approval count. But are you any worse off than
you'd have been with MDDA?
Forest (but maybe others too) has proposed a number of methods that
combine pairwise-count and Approval. Do any of those beat MDDA &
Smith//Approval by the standards of protecting one's strong top-set, and
Middle1 & Middle2?
in particular, do any of them do better than MDDA by those standards? Do
any do as well as MDDA by those standards and have as brief a defintion, or
nearly as brief a definition?
In other words, are there methods that achieve those things better than
MDDA & Smith//Approval, or achieve them better than MDDA and have as brief
a definition?
In fact, is there a method that meets FBC (or doesn't need it), meets CD,
and does as well by Middle1 & Middle2 as MDDA, Smith//Approval or Bucklin?
Michael Ossipoff
Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without having
to mention the Smith set:
List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate higher in
the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order adjacent members.
When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate at
the top of the list.
Note that the winner will automatically be a member of the top cycle, and
if it is a cycle of three, it will be the most approved member of the cycle.
Also notice that it yields an unambiguous social order, and that there can
be no second place complaint.
On Tue, Nov 15, 2016 at 5:19 PM, Michael Ossipoff <email9648742@gmail.com>
wrote:
> When I started my current EM participation, I was saying that 3-Slot ICT
> was my favorite method.
>
> That doesn't conflict with saying that I consider Approval the best,
> because I regard 3-Slot ICT, or unlimited-rankings ICT (when used
> approval-like) as an Approval version without chicken-dilemma.
>
> Later I realized that MDDTR is better than ICT, because it gives better
> protection to middle candidates.
>
> I measure that protection by how well they'd be protected if they were
> CWs. ...what it would take to protect their win, and how well it's
> protected.
>
> I define "middle candidates" as candidates you rank or rate below top and
> above bottom.
>
> ICT gives no protection to middle candidates, against burial, or even
> against innocent, non-strategic truncation--the two things that threaten a
> CWs in pairwise-c0unt methods.
>
> MDDTR gives full truncation-proofness to middle candidates, but (contrary
> to what I earlier believed), its protection of middle candidates against
> burial can only be called "shabby".
>
> By the way, I no longer think that ICT or MDDTR needs to be 3-slot. 3-Slot
> would be fine with me, because I believe that ICT or MDDTR should be used
> as Approval, and that middle rating or ranking should only be used when
> seriously needed to deter chicken-dilemma defection. When middle is used in
> an unlimited-ranking MDDTR or ICT, it should probably consist of 2nd-place
> ranking, if you want to give the demoted candidates the best protection.
> ...but maybe you'd rather rank them with respect to eachother, at different
> middle levels, as I probably sometimes would.
>
> But, as I've been saying, activists & organizations seem to like rankings,
> and some people--overcompromisers & rival parties--might very well need
> rankings to soften their voting errors.
>
> And it seems to me that there's no particular reason not to rank, in order
> of preference, your middle candidates, if some of them are better than
> others, or if the voters of some of them are less trustworthy than others.
>
> So, that's if you want CD, in addition to FBC, and good protection for
> middle candidates
>
> Even if you're using the method as Approval, you still want your demoted
> candidate(s) to be well protected. Just because you don't trust hir voters
> doesn't mean you want to throw her to the hounds and thereby lower Pt, the
> probability of electing from your strong top-set.
>
> Anyway, so far, this is all referring to CD methods.
>
> Of those, I like MDDTR best. As a rank method, it (as i said) gives only
> shabby burial-protection to a middle candidate. But evidently (please tell
> me it isn't so) you can't have FBC, CD, and good protection of middle
> candidates.
>
> I consider CD more important to how well protected middle candidates are.
> Yes, FBC + CD give poor protection to middle candidates, and that lessens
> the value of their CD. But non-CD methods don't have CD at all, and that's
> worse.
>
> So I prefer MDDTR to methods that give better protection to middle
> candidates, but don't have CD.
>
> So, where I used to say that my favorite method is 3-Slot ICT, now I say
> that my favorite method is MDDTR. Preferably with unlimited rankings.
> (Though one could use only the 1st, 2nd, & bottom positions if one chose
> to). ...regardable as a chicken-dilemma-free version of Approval.
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Non-CD methods with better "middle-strategy" than CD methods:
>
> But, in an election, I'm just one voter, and so, how well-suited the
> method is to me is less important, and won't affect the outcome as much, in
> comparison to how well-suited the method is to lots of progressives.
>
> So, what if most progressives would rather have a method that's really
> good as a rank method, a method that has good "middle strategy" (strategy
> for protecting a middle candidate's win if s/he's CWs).
>
> That would be important if you knew that all or nearly all, or even most
> of them were going to use the method purely as a rank method.
>
> Bucklin is the traditional FBC rankings-method.
>
> I distinguish 2 kinds of middle strategy merit:
>
> 1. How well the method protects top-ranked candidates against
> middle-ranked candidates. I call that "Middle1"
>
> 2. How well the lmethod protects a middle-ranked candidate against any
> candidate you rank lower than hir. I call that "Middle2".
>
> So, how to get the best middle strategy, with the main goal still being
> keeping a good probability, Pt, of electing from your strong top-set?
>
> MDDTR's middle1 seems better than that of Bucklin. In MDDTR, you're voting
> to contribute to a majority for your top against your middle. In Bucklin,
> you can protect top against middle by skipping some rating-levels above the
> middle candidates. In that way, you can give the top candidates time to
> receive the coalescing lower-choice votes that they'll get from the
> preferrers of other candidates, before giving anything to the middle
> candidates.
>
> That's a bit more work than just ranking in order of preference. It
> requires you to judge where, and how far down in rankings, your top
> candidates are going to receive lower-choice votes from.
>
> So I suggest that MDDTR does better at Middle1 than Bucklin does.
>
> But Bucklin does better at Middle2.
>
> In Bucklin, the CWs's win is protected by the people who pretty-much agree
> with you, the people of your wing, merely not ranking down too far.
>
> MDDTR needs that too, but it isn't enough to give MDDTR more than shabby
> protection.
>
> ...And Bucklin's Middle1, though not as convenient or easy as that of
> MDDTR, isn't as questionable as MDDTR's Middle2.
>
> So, overall, I'd say that Bucklin's Middle Strategy is better than that of
> MDDTR. So, for people who want to use the method purely as a rank-method,
> Bucklin is better than MDDTR.
>
> Bucklin also has the advantage of use-precedent. MDDT has the advantage
> of precinct-summability,but I don't consider that essential.
>
> For voters using the method purely as a rank method, I'd prefer Bucklin to
> MDDTR.
>
> Chicken dilemma won't happen all the time, probably won't happen often.
> But middle-protection will always matter to people using it as a rank
> method.
>
> But it seems to me that, once we give up CD (for voters who need good
> middle strategly, because of their rank voting), then it might be possible
> to do better than Bucklin.
>
> It seems to me that methods that use both Approval and pairwise-count can
> do better than Bucklin, at middle protection.
>
> A lot of methods of that kind have been proposed, and I've ignored all of
> them because they don't meet CD. But, as mentioned above, for some
> electorates, middle strategy could be more important.
>
> It seems to me that MDDA (also evidently named MPOA) and Smith//Approval
> are two methods that might be better than Bucklin at middle protection..
>
> Using Approval as the cycle-solution is a very powerful idea (if you're
> willing to give up CD, for an electorate's needs). But most of you already
> knew that, before I paid attention to it (...because I was only looking at
> CD methods)..
>
> MDDA's & Smith//Approval's burial vulnerability doesn't matter much, when
> the Approval winner wins the cycle. In fact, Smith//Approval's
> truncation-vulnerability could even be regarded as an advantage, for when
> your strong top-set doesn't include the CWs.
>
> MDDA & Smith//Approval look better to me than Bucklin.
>
> Simpler Middle1.
>
> Precinct-Summability is an added bonus.
>
> MDDA seems to have a briefer definition than either Bucklin or
> Smith//Approval, and brief definition can be decisive.
>
> I know of Bucklin being rejected when MDDTR was accepted. MDDA would
> almost surely have been accepted too.
>
> I don't think Smith//Approval would go over well, with its need to define
> the Smith set, which greatly lengthens the definition.
>
> For an electorate that need good Middle1 & Middle2 more than CD, MDDA
> seems the winner so far.
>
> Smith//Approvsl of course meets Smith. ...which of course means that it
> fails FBC. But does it need FBC?
>
> It could be argued (but I don't know if it's true) that Smith//Approval
> doesn't need FBC, because, though you don't have an efffective Approval
> vote at the top, you still can vote Approval, with the approval-cutoff, or
> by only ranking your strong top-set.
>
> So, though Compromise could become pair-beaten by Favorite because you
> raise Favorite to top with Compromise, resulting in a cycle instead of a
> CWv win for Favorite, the cycle will be judged by approvals, and you're
> approved only your strong top-set.
>
> Of course, just because Favorite was almost the CWv doesn't necessarily
> mean that s/he'll win the Approval count. But are you any worse off than
> you'd have been with MDDA?
>
> Forest (but maybe others too) has proposed a number of methods that
> combine pairwise-count and Approval. Do any of those beat MDDA &
> Smith//Approval by the standards of protecting one's strong top-set, and
> Middle1 & Middle2?
>
> in particular, do any of them do better than MDDA by those standards? Do
> any do as well as MDDA by those standards and have as brief a defintion, or
> nearly as brief a definition?
>
> In other words, are there methods that achieve those things better than
> MDDA & Smith//Approval, or achieve them better than MDDA and have as brief
> a definition?
>
> In fact, is there a method that meets FBC (or doesn't need it), meets CD,
> and does as well by Middle1 & Middle2 as MDDA, Smith//Approval or Bucklin?
>
> Michael Ossipoff
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
MP
Monkey Puzzle
Wed, Nov 16, 2016 10:55 PM
Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without having
to mention the Smith set:
List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate higher in
the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order adjacent members.
When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate at
the top of the list.
Note that the winner will automatically be a member of the top cycle, and
if it is a cycle of three, it will be the most approved member of the cycle.
Also notice that it yields an unambiguous social order, and that there can
be no second place complaint.
On Tue, Nov 15, 2016 at 5:19 PM, Michael Ossipoff email9648742@gmail.com
wrote:
When I started my current EM participation, I was saying that 3-Slot ICT
was my favorite method.
That doesn't conflict with saying that I consider Approval the best,
because I regard 3-Slot ICT, or unlimited-rankings ICT (when used
approval-like) as an Approval version without chicken-dilemma.
Later I realized that MDDTR is better than ICT, because it gives better
protection to middle candidates.
I measure that protection by how well they'd be protected if they were
CWs. ...what it would take to protect their win, and how well it's
protected.
I define "middle candidates" as candidates you rank or rate below top and
above bottom.
ICT gives no protection to middle candidates, against burial, or even
against innocent, non-strategic truncation--the two things that threaten a
CWs in pairwise-c0unt methods.
MDDTR gives full truncation-proofness to middle candidates, but (contrary
to what I earlier believed), its protection of middle candidates against
burial can only be called "shabby".
By the way, I no longer think that ICT or MDDTR needs to be 3-slot.
3-Slot would be fine with me, because I believe that ICT or MDDTR should be
used as Approval, and that middle rating or ranking should only be used
when seriously needed to deter chicken-dilemma defection. When middle is
used in an unlimited-ranking MDDTR or ICT, it should probably consist of
2nd-place ranking, if you want to give the demoted candidates the best
protection. ...but maybe you'd rather rank them with respect to
eachother, at different middle levels, as I probably sometimes would.
But, as I've been saying, activists & organizations seem to like
rankings, and some people--overcompromisers & rival parties--might very
well need rankings to soften their voting errors.
And it seems to me that there's no particular reason not to rank, in
order of preference, your middle candidates, if some of them are better
than others, or if the voters of some of them are less trustworthy than
others.
So, that's if you want CD, in addition to FBC, and good protection for
middle candidates
Even if you're using the method as Approval, you still want your demoted
candidate(s) to be well protected. Just because you don't trust hir voters
doesn't mean you want to throw her to the hounds and thereby lower Pt, the
probability of electing from your strong top-set.
Anyway, so far, this is all referring to CD methods.
Of those, I like MDDTR best. As a rank method, it (as i said) gives only
shabby burial-protection to a middle candidate. But evidently (please tell
me it isn't so) you can't have FBC, CD, and good protection of middle
candidates.
I consider CD more important to how well protected middle candidates are.
Yes, FBC + CD give poor protection to middle candidates, and that lessens
the value of their CD. But non-CD methods don't have CD at all, and that's
worse.
So I prefer MDDTR to methods that give better protection to middle
candidates, but don't have CD.
So, where I used to say that my favorite method is 3-Slot ICT, now I say
that my favorite method is MDDTR. Preferably with unlimited rankings.
(Though one could use only the 1st, 2nd, & bottom positions if one chose
to). ...regardable as a chicken-dilemma-free version of Approval.
Non-CD methods with better "middle-strategy" than CD methods:
But, in an election, I'm just one voter, and so, how well-suited the
method is to me is less important, and won't affect the outcome as much, in
comparison to how well-suited the method is to lots of progressives.
So, what if most progressives would rather have a method that's really
good as a rank method, a method that has good "middle strategy" (strategy
for protecting a middle candidate's win if s/he's CWs).
That would be important if you knew that all or nearly all, or even most
of them were going to use the method purely as a rank method.
Bucklin is the traditional FBC rankings-method.
I distinguish 2 kinds of middle strategy merit:
-
How well the method protects top-ranked candidates against
middle-ranked candidates. I call that "Middle1"
-
How well the lmethod protects a middle-ranked candidate against any
candidate you rank lower than hir. I call that "Middle2".
So, how to get the best middle strategy, with the main goal still being
keeping a good probability, Pt, of electing from your strong top-set?
MDDTR's middle1 seems better than that of Bucklin. In MDDTR, you're
voting to contribute to a majority for your top against your middle. In
Bucklin, you can protect top against middle by skipping some rating-levels
above the middle candidates. In that way, you can give the top candidates
time to receive the coalescing lower-choice votes that they'll get from the
preferrers of other candidates, before giving anything to the middle
candidates.
That's a bit more work than just ranking in order of preference. It
requires you to judge where, and how far down in rankings, your top
candidates are going to receive lower-choice votes from.
So I suggest that MDDTR does better at Middle1 than Bucklin does.
But Bucklin does better at Middle2.
In Bucklin, the CWs's win is protected by the people who pretty-much
agree with you, the people of your wing, merely not ranking down too far.
MDDTR needs that too, but it isn't enough to give MDDTR more than shabby
protection.
...And Bucklin's Middle1, though not as convenient or easy as that of
MDDTR, isn't as questionable as MDDTR's Middle2.
So, overall, I'd say that Bucklin's Middle Strategy is better than that
of MDDTR. So, for people who want to use the method purely as a
rank-method, Bucklin is better than MDDTR.
Bucklin also has the advantage of use-precedent. MDDT has the advantage
of precinct-summability,but I don't consider that essential.
For voters using the method purely as a rank method, I'd prefer Bucklin
to MDDTR.
Chicken dilemma won't happen all the time, probably won't happen often.
But middle-protection will always matter to people using it as a rank
method.
But it seems to me that, once we give up CD (for voters who need good
middle strategly, because of their rank voting), then it might be possible
to do better than Bucklin.
It seems to me that methods that use both Approval and pairwise-count can
do better than Bucklin, at middle protection.
A lot of methods of that kind have been proposed, and I've ignored all of
them because they don't meet CD. But, as mentioned above, for some
electorates, middle strategy could be more important.
It seems to me that MDDA (also evidently named MPOA) and Smith//Approval
are two methods that might be better than Bucklin at middle protection..
Using Approval as the cycle-solution is a very powerful idea (if you're
willing to give up CD, for an electorate's needs). But most of you already
knew that, before I paid attention to it (...because I was only looking at
CD methods)..
MDDA's & Smith//Approval's burial vulnerability doesn't matter much, when
the Approval winner wins the cycle. In fact, Smith//Approval's
truncation-vulnerability could even be regarded as an advantage, for when
your strong top-set doesn't include the CWs.
MDDA & Smith//Approval look better to me than Bucklin.
Simpler Middle1.
Precinct-Summability is an added bonus.
MDDA seems to have a briefer definition than either Bucklin or
Smith//Approval, and brief definition can be decisive.
I know of Bucklin being rejected when MDDTR was accepted. MDDA would
almost surely have been accepted too.
I don't think Smith//Approval would go over well, with its need to
define the Smith set, which greatly lengthens the definition.
For an electorate that need good Middle1 & Middle2 more than CD, MDDA
seems the winner so far.
Smith//Approvsl of course meets Smith. ...which of course means that it
fails FBC. But does it need FBC?
It could be argued (but I don't know if it's true) that Smith//Approval
doesn't need FBC, because, though you don't have an efffective Approval
vote at the top, you still can vote Approval, with the approval-cutoff, or
by only ranking your strong top-set.
So, though Compromise could become pair-beaten by Favorite because you
raise Favorite to top with Compromise, resulting in a cycle instead of a
CWv win for Favorite, the cycle will be judged by approvals, and you're
approved only your strong top-set.
Of course, just because Favorite was almost the CWv doesn't necessarily
mean that s/he'll win the Approval count. But are you any worse off than
you'd have been with MDDA?
Forest (but maybe others too) has proposed a number of methods that
combine pairwise-count and Approval. Do any of those beat MDDA &
Smith//Approval by the standards of protecting one's strong top-set, and
Middle1 & Middle2?
in particular, do any of them do better than MDDA by those standards? Do
any do as well as MDDA by those standards and have as brief a defintion, or
nearly as brief a definition?
In other words, are there methods that achieve those things better than
MDDA & Smith//Approval, or achieve them better than MDDA and have as brief
a definition?
In fact, is there a method that meets FBC (or doesn't need it), meets CD,
and does as well by Middle1 & Middle2 as MDDA, Smith//Approval or Bucklin?
Michael Ossipoff
Hi Forest,
Is your suggestion different from Pairwise Sorted Approval?
http://wiki.electorama.com/wiki/Pairwise_Sorted_Approval
If not, the winner is not necessarily the most approved candidate in the
Smith set.
Frango ut patefaciam -- I break so that I may reveal
On Wed, Nov 16, 2016 at 2:30 PM, Forest Simmons <fsimmons@pcc.edu> wrote:
> Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without having
> to mention the Smith set:
>
> List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
> bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate higher in
> the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order adjacent members.
>
> When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate at
> the top of the list.
>
> Note that the winner will automatically be a member of the top cycle, and
> if it is a cycle of three, it will be the most approved member of the cycle.
>
> Also notice that it yields an unambiguous social order, and that there can
> be no second place complaint.
>
> On Tue, Nov 15, 2016 at 5:19 PM, Michael Ossipoff <email9648742@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> When I started my current EM participation, I was saying that 3-Slot ICT
>> was my favorite method.
>>
>> That doesn't conflict with saying that I consider Approval the best,
>> because I regard 3-Slot ICT, or unlimited-rankings ICT (when used
>> approval-like) as an Approval version without chicken-dilemma.
>>
>> Later I realized that MDDTR is better than ICT, because it gives better
>> protection to middle candidates.
>>
>> I measure that protection by how well they'd be protected if they were
>> CWs. ...what it would take to protect their win, and how well it's
>> protected.
>>
>> I define "middle candidates" as candidates you rank or rate below top and
>> above bottom.
>>
>> ICT gives no protection to middle candidates, against burial, or even
>> against innocent, non-strategic truncation--the two things that threaten a
>> CWs in pairwise-c0unt methods.
>>
>> MDDTR gives full truncation-proofness to middle candidates, but (contrary
>> to what I earlier believed), its protection of middle candidates against
>> burial can only be called "shabby".
>>
>> By the way, I no longer think that ICT or MDDTR needs to be 3-slot.
>> 3-Slot would be fine with me, because I believe that ICT or MDDTR should be
>> used as Approval, and that middle rating or ranking should only be used
>> when seriously needed to deter chicken-dilemma defection. When middle is
>> used in an unlimited-ranking MDDTR or ICT, it should probably consist of
>> 2nd-place ranking, if you want to give the demoted candidates the best
>> protection. ...but maybe you'd rather rank them with respect to
>> eachother, at different middle levels, as I probably sometimes would.
>>
>> But, as I've been saying, activists & organizations seem to like
>> rankings, and some people--overcompromisers & rival parties--might very
>> well need rankings to soften their voting errors.
>>
>> And it seems to me that there's no particular reason not to rank, in
>> order of preference, your middle candidates, if some of them are better
>> than others, or if the voters of some of them are less trustworthy than
>> others.
>>
>> So, that's if you want CD, in addition to FBC, and good protection for
>> middle candidates
>>
>> Even if you're using the method as Approval, you still want your demoted
>> candidate(s) to be well protected. Just because you don't trust hir voters
>> doesn't mean you want to throw her to the hounds and thereby lower Pt, the
>> probability of electing from your strong top-set.
>>
>> Anyway, so far, this is all referring to CD methods.
>>
>> Of those, I like MDDTR best. As a rank method, it (as i said) gives only
>> shabby burial-protection to a middle candidate. But evidently (please tell
>> me it isn't so) you can't have FBC, CD, and good protection of middle
>> candidates.
>>
>> I consider CD more important to how well protected middle candidates are.
>> Yes, FBC + CD give poor protection to middle candidates, and that lessens
>> the value of their CD. But non-CD methods don't have CD at all, and that's
>> worse.
>>
>> So I prefer MDDTR to methods that give better protection to middle
>> candidates, but don't have CD.
>>
>> So, where I used to say that my favorite method is 3-Slot ICT, now I say
>> that my favorite method is MDDTR. Preferably with unlimited rankings.
>> (Though one could use only the 1st, 2nd, & bottom positions if one chose
>> to). ...regardable as a chicken-dilemma-free version of Approval.
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> Non-CD methods with better "middle-strategy" than CD methods:
>>
>> But, in an election, I'm just one voter, and so, how well-suited the
>> method is to me is less important, and won't affect the outcome as much, in
>> comparison to how well-suited the method is to lots of progressives.
>>
>> So, what if most progressives would rather have a method that's really
>> good as a rank method, a method that has good "middle strategy" (strategy
>> for protecting a middle candidate's win if s/he's CWs).
>>
>> That would be important if you knew that all or nearly all, or even most
>> of them were going to use the method purely as a rank method.
>>
>> Bucklin is the traditional FBC rankings-method.
>>
>> I distinguish 2 kinds of middle strategy merit:
>>
>> 1. How well the method protects top-ranked candidates against
>> middle-ranked candidates. I call that "Middle1"
>>
>> 2. How well the lmethod protects a middle-ranked candidate against any
>> candidate you rank lower than hir. I call that "Middle2".
>>
>> So, how to get the best middle strategy, with the main goal still being
>> keeping a good probability, Pt, of electing from your strong top-set?
>>
>> MDDTR's middle1 seems better than that of Bucklin. In MDDTR, you're
>> voting to contribute to a majority for your top against your middle. In
>> Bucklin, you can protect top against middle by skipping some rating-levels
>> above the middle candidates. In that way, you can give the top candidates
>> time to receive the coalescing lower-choice votes that they'll get from the
>> preferrers of other candidates, before giving anything to the middle
>> candidates.
>>
>> That's a bit more work than just ranking in order of preference. It
>> requires you to judge where, and how far down in rankings, your top
>> candidates are going to receive lower-choice votes from.
>>
>> So I suggest that MDDTR does better at Middle1 than Bucklin does.
>>
>> But Bucklin does better at Middle2.
>>
>> In Bucklin, the CWs's win is protected by the people who pretty-much
>> agree with you, the people of your wing, merely not ranking down too far.
>>
>> MDDTR needs that too, but it isn't enough to give MDDTR more than shabby
>> protection.
>>
>> ...And Bucklin's Middle1, though not as convenient or easy as that of
>> MDDTR, isn't as questionable as MDDTR's Middle2.
>>
>> So, overall, I'd say that Bucklin's Middle Strategy is better than that
>> of MDDTR. So, for people who want to use the method purely as a
>> rank-method, Bucklin is better than MDDTR.
>>
>> Bucklin also has the advantage of use-precedent. MDDT has the advantage
>> of precinct-summability,but I don't consider that essential.
>>
>> For voters using the method purely as a rank method, I'd prefer Bucklin
>> to MDDTR.
>>
>> Chicken dilemma won't happen all the time, probably won't happen often.
>> But middle-protection will always matter to people using it as a rank
>> method.
>>
>> But it seems to me that, once we give up CD (for voters who need good
>> middle strategly, because of their rank voting), then it might be possible
>> to do better than Bucklin.
>>
>> It seems to me that methods that use both Approval and pairwise-count can
>> do better than Bucklin, at middle protection.
>>
>> A lot of methods of that kind have been proposed, and I've ignored all of
>> them because they don't meet CD. But, as mentioned above, for some
>> electorates, middle strategy could be more important.
>>
>> It seems to me that MDDA (also evidently named MPOA) and Smith//Approval
>> are two methods that might be better than Bucklin at middle protection..
>>
>> Using Approval as the cycle-solution is a very powerful idea (if you're
>> willing to give up CD, for an electorate's needs). But most of you already
>> knew that, before I paid attention to it (...because I was only looking at
>> CD methods)..
>>
>> MDDA's & Smith//Approval's burial vulnerability doesn't matter much, when
>> the Approval winner wins the cycle. In fact, Smith//Approval's
>> truncation-vulnerability could even be regarded as an advantage, for when
>> your strong top-set doesn't include the CWs.
>>
>> MDDA & Smith//Approval look better to me than Bucklin.
>>
>> Simpler Middle1.
>>
>> Precinct-Summability is an added bonus.
>>
>> MDDA seems to have a briefer definition than either Bucklin or
>> Smith//Approval, and brief definition can be decisive.
>>
>> I know of Bucklin being rejected when MDDTR was accepted. MDDA would
>> almost surely have been accepted too.
>>
>> I don't think Smith//Approval would go over well, with its need to
>> define the Smith set, which greatly lengthens the definition.
>>
>> For an electorate that need good Middle1 & Middle2 more than CD, MDDA
>> seems the winner so far.
>>
>> Smith//Approvsl of course meets Smith. ...which of course means that it
>> fails FBC. But does it need FBC?
>>
>> It could be argued (but I don't know if it's true) that Smith//Approval
>> doesn't need FBC, because, though you don't have an efffective Approval
>> vote at the top, you still can vote Approval, with the approval-cutoff, or
>> by only ranking your strong top-set.
>>
>> So, though Compromise could become pair-beaten by Favorite because you
>> raise Favorite to top with Compromise, resulting in a cycle instead of a
>> CWv win for Favorite, the cycle will be judged by approvals, and you're
>> approved only your strong top-set.
>>
>> Of course, just because Favorite was almost the CWv doesn't necessarily
>> mean that s/he'll win the Approval count. But are you any worse off than
>> you'd have been with MDDA?
>>
>> Forest (but maybe others too) has proposed a number of methods that
>> combine pairwise-count and Approval. Do any of those beat MDDA &
>> Smith//Approval by the standards of protecting one's strong top-set, and
>> Middle1 & Middle2?
>>
>> in particular, do any of them do better than MDDA by those standards? Do
>> any do as well as MDDA by those standards and have as brief a defintion, or
>> nearly as brief a definition?
>>
>> In other words, are there methods that achieve those things better than
>> MDDA & Smith//Approval, or achieve them better than MDDA and have as brief
>> a definition?
>>
>> In fact, is there a method that meets FBC (or doesn't need it), meets CD,
>> and does as well by Middle1 & Middle2 as MDDA, Smith//Approval or Bucklin?
>>
>> Michael Ossipoff
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
> ----
> Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
>
>
MO
Michael Ossipoff
Thu, Nov 17, 2016 2:21 AM
Alright, thanks! That answers my question about how one of your
Approval/Pairwise proposals (Pairwise-Sorted Approval) relate to these
goals, and it means that, there's a good,brief and natural definition
that's equivalent to Smith//Approval.
That's briefly-defined enough to be in the list of methods that should be
offered to the public and to the initiative proposal committee when a
voting-system reform is being considered.
Your other Approval/Pairwise method that I remember, the Approval
Cover-Ladder method, is probably too complicated though.
I'm looking at some of the old proposals, including MDDA, MDDTR, MAMPO,
MMD-Bucklin, etc, that might do well by the standards that I spoke of.
I personally prefer MDDTR to MDDA, if people only use below-top ranking
when absolutely necessary in a chicken-dilemma situation. ...because I'd
rather have CD than routine use of middle ranking.
But, especially if the method wouldn't always be used in that way, MDDA
would be a lot safer from an embarrassing & bad result due to its poor
protection from burial.
Michael Ossipoff
On Wed, Nov 16, 2016 at 5:30 PM, Forest Simmons fsimmons@pcc.edu wrote:
Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without having
to mention the Smith set:
List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate higher in
the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order adjacent members.
When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate at
the top of the list.
Note that the winner will automatically be a member of the top cycle, and
if it is a cycle of three, it will be the most approved member of the cycle.
Also notice that it yields an unambiguous social order, and that there can
be no second place complaint.
On Tue, Nov 15, 2016 at 5:19 PM, Michael Ossipoff email9648742@gmail.com
wrote:
When I started my current EM participation, I was saying that 3-Slot ICT
was my favorite method.
That doesn't conflict with saying that I consider Approval the best,
because I regard 3-Slot ICT, or unlimited-rankings ICT (when used
approval-like) as an Approval version without chicken-dilemma.
Later I realized that MDDTR is better than ICT, because it gives better
protection to middle candidates.
I measure that protection by how well they'd be protected if they were
CWs. ...what it would take to protect their win, and how well it's
protected.
I define "middle candidates" as candidates you rank or rate below top and
above bottom.
ICT gives no protection to middle candidates, against burial, or even
against innocent, non-strategic truncation--the two things that threaten a
CWs in pairwise-c0unt methods.
MDDTR gives full truncation-proofness to middle candidates, but (contrary
to what I earlier believed), its protection of middle candidates against
burial can only be called "shabby".
By the way, I no longer think that ICT or MDDTR needs to be 3-slot.
3-Slot would be fine with me, because I believe that ICT or MDDTR should be
used as Approval, and that middle rating or ranking should only be used
when seriously needed to deter chicken-dilemma defection. When middle is
used in an unlimited-ranking MDDTR or ICT, it should probably consist of
2nd-place ranking, if you want to give the demoted candidates the best
protection. ...but maybe you'd rather rank them with respect to
eachother, at different middle levels, as I probably sometimes would.
But, as I've been saying, activists & organizations seem to like
rankings, and some people--overcompromisers & rival parties--might very
well need rankings to soften their voting errors.
And it seems to me that there's no particular reason not to rank, in
order of preference, your middle candidates, if some of them are better
than others, or if the voters of some of them are less trustworthy than
others.
So, that's if you want CD, in addition to FBC, and good protection for
middle candidates
Even if you're using the method as Approval, you still want your demoted
candidate(s) to be well protected. Just because you don't trust hir voters
doesn't mean you want to throw her to the hounds and thereby lower Pt, the
probability of electing from your strong top-set.
Anyway, so far, this is all referring to CD methods.
Of those, I like MDDTR best. As a rank method, it (as i said) gives only
shabby burial-protection to a middle candidate. But evidently (please tell
me it isn't so) you can't have FBC, CD, and good protection of middle
candidates.
I consider CD more important to how well protected middle candidates are.
Yes, FBC + CD give poor protection to middle candidates, and that lessens
the value of their CD. But non-CD methods don't have CD at all, and that's
worse.
So I prefer MDDTR to methods that give better protection to middle
candidates, but don't have CD.
So, where I used to say that my favorite method is 3-Slot ICT, now I say
that my favorite method is MDDTR. Preferably with unlimited rankings.
(Though one could use only the 1st, 2nd, & bottom positions if one chose
to). ...regardable as a chicken-dilemma-free version of Approval.
Non-CD methods with better "middle-strategy" than CD methods:
But, in an election, I'm just one voter, and so, how well-suited the
method is to me is less important, and won't affect the outcome as much, in
comparison to how well-suited the method is to lots of progressives.
So, what if most progressives would rather have a method that's really
good as a rank method, a method that has good "middle strategy" (strategy
for protecting a middle candidate's win if s/he's CWs).
That would be important if you knew that all or nearly all, or even most
of them were going to use the method purely as a rank method.
Bucklin is the traditional FBC rankings-method.
I distinguish 2 kinds of middle strategy merit:
-
How well the method protects top-ranked candidates against
middle-ranked candidates. I call that "Middle1"
-
How well the lmethod protects a middle-ranked candidate against any
candidate you rank lower than hir. I call that "Middle2".
So, how to get the best middle strategy, with the main goal still being
keeping a good probability, Pt, of electing from your strong top-set?
MDDTR's middle1 seems better than that of Bucklin. In MDDTR, you're
voting to contribute to a majority for your top against your middle. In
Bucklin, you can protect top against middle by skipping some rating-levels
above the middle candidates. In that way, you can give the top candidates
time to receive the coalescing lower-choice votes that they'll get from the
preferrers of other candidates, before giving anything to the middle
candidates.
That's a bit more work than just ranking in order of preference. It
requires you to judge where, and how far down in rankings, your top
candidates are going to receive lower-choice votes from.
So I suggest that MDDTR does better at Middle1 than Bucklin does.
But Bucklin does better at Middle2.
In Bucklin, the CWs's win is protected by the people who pretty-much
agree with you, the people of your wing, merely not ranking down too far.
MDDTR needs that too, but it isn't enough to give MDDTR more than shabby
protection.
...And Bucklin's Middle1, though not as convenient or easy as that of
MDDTR, isn't as questionable as MDDTR's Middle2.
So, overall, I'd say that Bucklin's Middle Strategy is better than that
of MDDTR. So, for people who want to use the method purely as a
rank-method, Bucklin is better than MDDTR.
Bucklin also has the advantage of use-precedent. MDDT has the advantage
of precinct-summability,but I don't consider that essential.
For voters using the method purely as a rank method, I'd prefer Bucklin
to MDDTR.
Chicken dilemma won't happen all the time, probably won't happen often.
But middle-protection will always matter to people using it as a rank
method.
But it seems to me that, once we give up CD (for voters who need good
middle strategly, because of their rank voting), then it might be possible
to do better than Bucklin.
It seems to me that methods that use both Approval and pairwise-count can
do better than Bucklin, at middle protection.
A lot of methods of that kind have been proposed, and I've ignored all of
them because they don't meet CD. But, as mentioned above, for some
electorates, middle strategy could be more important.
It seems to me that MDDA (also evidently named MPOA) and Smith//Approval
are two methods that might be better than Bucklin at middle protection..
Using Approval as the cycle-solution is a very powerful idea (if you're
willing to give up CD, for an electorate's needs). But most of you already
knew that, before I paid attention to it (...because I was only looking at
CD methods)..
MDDA's & Smith//Approval's burial vulnerability doesn't matter much, when
the Approval winner wins the cycle. In fact, Smith//Approval's
truncation-vulnerability could even be regarded as an advantage, for when
your strong top-set doesn't include the CWs.
MDDA & Smith//Approval look better to me than Bucklin.
Simpler Middle1.
Precinct-Summability is an added bonus.
MDDA seems to have a briefer definition than either Bucklin or
Smith//Approval, and brief definition can be decisive.
I know of Bucklin being rejected when MDDTR was accepted. MDDA would
almost surely have been accepted too.
I don't think Smith//Approval would go over well, with its need to
define the Smith set, which greatly lengthens the definition.
For an electorate that need good Middle1 & Middle2 more than CD, MDDA
seems the winner so far.
Smith//Approvsl of course meets Smith. ...which of course means that it
fails FBC. But does it need FBC?
It could be argued (but I don't know if it's true) that Smith//Approval
doesn't need FBC, because, though you don't have an efffective Approval
vote at the top, you still can vote Approval, with the approval-cutoff, or
by only ranking your strong top-set.
So, though Compromise could become pair-beaten by Favorite because you
raise Favorite to top with Compromise, resulting in a cycle instead of a
CWv win for Favorite, the cycle will be judged by approvals, and you're
approved only your strong top-set.
Of course, just because Favorite was almost the CWv doesn't necessarily
mean that s/he'll win the Approval count. But are you any worse off than
you'd have been with MDDA?
Forest (but maybe others too) has proposed a number of methods that
combine pairwise-count and Approval. Do any of those beat MDDA &
Smith//Approval by the standards of protecting one's strong top-set, and
Middle1 & Middle2?
in particular, do any of them do better than MDDA by those standards? Do
any do as well as MDDA by those standards and have as brief a defintion, or
nearly as brief a definition?
In other words, are there methods that achieve those things better than
MDDA & Smith//Approval, or achieve them better than MDDA and have as brief
a definition?
In fact, is there a method that meets FBC (or doesn't need it), meets CD,
and does as well by Middle1 & Middle2 as MDDA, Smith//Approval or Bucklin?
Michael Ossipoff
Alright, thanks! That answers my question about how one of your
Approval/Pairwise proposals (Pairwise-Sorted Approval) relate to these
goals, and it means that, there's a good,brief and natural definition
that's equivalent to Smith//Approval.
That's briefly-defined enough to be in the list of methods that should be
offered to the public and to the initiative proposal committee when a
voting-system reform is being considered.
Your other Approval/Pairwise method that I remember, the Approval
Cover-Ladder method, is probably too complicated though.
I'm looking at some of the old proposals, including MDDA, MDDTR, MAMPO,
MMD-Bucklin, etc, that might do well by the standards that I spoke of.
I personally prefer MDDTR to MDDA, if people only use below-top ranking
when absolutely necessary in a chicken-dilemma situation. ...because I'd
rather have CD than routine use of middle ranking.
But, especially if the method wouldn't always be used in that way, MDDA
would be a lot safer from an embarrassing & bad result due to its poor
protection from burial.
Michael Ossipoff
On Wed, Nov 16, 2016 at 5:30 PM, Forest Simmons <fsimmons@pcc.edu> wrote:
> Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without having
> to mention the Smith set:
>
> List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
> bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate higher in
> the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order adjacent members.
>
> When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate at
> the top of the list.
>
> Note that the winner will automatically be a member of the top cycle, and
> if it is a cycle of three, it will be the most approved member of the cycle.
>
> Also notice that it yields an unambiguous social order, and that there can
> be no second place complaint.
>
> On Tue, Nov 15, 2016 at 5:19 PM, Michael Ossipoff <email9648742@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> When I started my current EM participation, I was saying that 3-Slot ICT
>> was my favorite method.
>>
>> That doesn't conflict with saying that I consider Approval the best,
>> because I regard 3-Slot ICT, or unlimited-rankings ICT (when used
>> approval-like) as an Approval version without chicken-dilemma.
>>
>> Later I realized that MDDTR is better than ICT, because it gives better
>> protection to middle candidates.
>>
>> I measure that protection by how well they'd be protected if they were
>> CWs. ...what it would take to protect their win, and how well it's
>> protected.
>>
>> I define "middle candidates" as candidates you rank or rate below top and
>> above bottom.
>>
>> ICT gives no protection to middle candidates, against burial, or even
>> against innocent, non-strategic truncation--the two things that threaten a
>> CWs in pairwise-c0unt methods.
>>
>> MDDTR gives full truncation-proofness to middle candidates, but (contrary
>> to what I earlier believed), its protection of middle candidates against
>> burial can only be called "shabby".
>>
>> By the way, I no longer think that ICT or MDDTR needs to be 3-slot.
>> 3-Slot would be fine with me, because I believe that ICT or MDDTR should be
>> used as Approval, and that middle rating or ranking should only be used
>> when seriously needed to deter chicken-dilemma defection. When middle is
>> used in an unlimited-ranking MDDTR or ICT, it should probably consist of
>> 2nd-place ranking, if you want to give the demoted candidates the best
>> protection. ...but maybe you'd rather rank them with respect to
>> eachother, at different middle levels, as I probably sometimes would.
>>
>> But, as I've been saying, activists & organizations seem to like
>> rankings, and some people--overcompromisers & rival parties--might very
>> well need rankings to soften their voting errors.
>>
>> And it seems to me that there's no particular reason not to rank, in
>> order of preference, your middle candidates, if some of them are better
>> than others, or if the voters of some of them are less trustworthy than
>> others.
>>
>> So, that's if you want CD, in addition to FBC, and good protection for
>> middle candidates
>>
>> Even if you're using the method as Approval, you still want your demoted
>> candidate(s) to be well protected. Just because you don't trust hir voters
>> doesn't mean you want to throw her to the hounds and thereby lower Pt, the
>> probability of electing from your strong top-set.
>>
>> Anyway, so far, this is all referring to CD methods.
>>
>> Of those, I like MDDTR best. As a rank method, it (as i said) gives only
>> shabby burial-protection to a middle candidate. But evidently (please tell
>> me it isn't so) you can't have FBC, CD, and good protection of middle
>> candidates.
>>
>> I consider CD more important to how well protected middle candidates are.
>> Yes, FBC + CD give poor protection to middle candidates, and that lessens
>> the value of their CD. But non-CD methods don't have CD at all, and that's
>> worse.
>>
>> So I prefer MDDTR to methods that give better protection to middle
>> candidates, but don't have CD.
>>
>> So, where I used to say that my favorite method is 3-Slot ICT, now I say
>> that my favorite method is MDDTR. Preferably with unlimited rankings.
>> (Though one could use only the 1st, 2nd, & bottom positions if one chose
>> to). ...regardable as a chicken-dilemma-free version of Approval.
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> Non-CD methods with better "middle-strategy" than CD methods:
>>
>> But, in an election, I'm just one voter, and so, how well-suited the
>> method is to me is less important, and won't affect the outcome as much, in
>> comparison to how well-suited the method is to lots of progressives.
>>
>> So, what if most progressives would rather have a method that's really
>> good as a rank method, a method that has good "middle strategy" (strategy
>> for protecting a middle candidate's win if s/he's CWs).
>>
>> That would be important if you knew that all or nearly all, or even most
>> of them were going to use the method purely as a rank method.
>>
>> Bucklin is the traditional FBC rankings-method.
>>
>> I distinguish 2 kinds of middle strategy merit:
>>
>> 1. How well the method protects top-ranked candidates against
>> middle-ranked candidates. I call that "Middle1"
>>
>> 2. How well the lmethod protects a middle-ranked candidate against any
>> candidate you rank lower than hir. I call that "Middle2".
>>
>> So, how to get the best middle strategy, with the main goal still being
>> keeping a good probability, Pt, of electing from your strong top-set?
>>
>> MDDTR's middle1 seems better than that of Bucklin. In MDDTR, you're
>> voting to contribute to a majority for your top against your middle. In
>> Bucklin, you can protect top against middle by skipping some rating-levels
>> above the middle candidates. In that way, you can give the top candidates
>> time to receive the coalescing lower-choice votes that they'll get from the
>> preferrers of other candidates, before giving anything to the middle
>> candidates.
>>
>> That's a bit more work than just ranking in order of preference. It
>> requires you to judge where, and how far down in rankings, your top
>> candidates are going to receive lower-choice votes from.
>>
>> So I suggest that MDDTR does better at Middle1 than Bucklin does.
>>
>> But Bucklin does better at Middle2.
>>
>> In Bucklin, the CWs's win is protected by the people who pretty-much
>> agree with you, the people of your wing, merely not ranking down too far.
>>
>> MDDTR needs that too, but it isn't enough to give MDDTR more than shabby
>> protection.
>>
>> ...And Bucklin's Middle1, though not as convenient or easy as that of
>> MDDTR, isn't as questionable as MDDTR's Middle2.
>>
>> So, overall, I'd say that Bucklin's Middle Strategy is better than that
>> of MDDTR. So, for people who want to use the method purely as a
>> rank-method, Bucklin is better than MDDTR.
>>
>> Bucklin also has the advantage of use-precedent. MDDT has the advantage
>> of precinct-summability,but I don't consider that essential.
>>
>> For voters using the method purely as a rank method, I'd prefer Bucklin
>> to MDDTR.
>>
>> Chicken dilemma won't happen all the time, probably won't happen often.
>> But middle-protection will always matter to people using it as a rank
>> method.
>>
>> But it seems to me that, once we give up CD (for voters who need good
>> middle strategly, because of their rank voting), then it might be possible
>> to do better than Bucklin.
>>
>> It seems to me that methods that use both Approval and pairwise-count can
>> do better than Bucklin, at middle protection.
>>
>> A lot of methods of that kind have been proposed, and I've ignored all of
>> them because they don't meet CD. But, as mentioned above, for some
>> electorates, middle strategy could be more important.
>>
>> It seems to me that MDDA (also evidently named MPOA) and Smith//Approval
>> are two methods that might be better than Bucklin at middle protection..
>>
>> Using Approval as the cycle-solution is a very powerful idea (if you're
>> willing to give up CD, for an electorate's needs). But most of you already
>> knew that, before I paid attention to it (...because I was only looking at
>> CD methods)..
>>
>> MDDA's & Smith//Approval's burial vulnerability doesn't matter much, when
>> the Approval winner wins the cycle. In fact, Smith//Approval's
>> truncation-vulnerability could even be regarded as an advantage, for when
>> your strong top-set doesn't include the CWs.
>>
>> MDDA & Smith//Approval look better to me than Bucklin.
>>
>> Simpler Middle1.
>>
>> Precinct-Summability is an added bonus.
>>
>> MDDA seems to have a briefer definition than either Bucklin or
>> Smith//Approval, and brief definition can be decisive.
>>
>> I know of Bucklin being rejected when MDDTR was accepted. MDDA would
>> almost surely have been accepted too.
>>
>> I don't think Smith//Approval would go over well, with its need to
>> define the Smith set, which greatly lengthens the definition.
>>
>> For an electorate that need good Middle1 & Middle2 more than CD, MDDA
>> seems the winner so far.
>>
>> Smith//Approvsl of course meets Smith. ...which of course means that it
>> fails FBC. But does it need FBC?
>>
>> It could be argued (but I don't know if it's true) that Smith//Approval
>> doesn't need FBC, because, though you don't have an efffective Approval
>> vote at the top, you still can vote Approval, with the approval-cutoff, or
>> by only ranking your strong top-set.
>>
>> So, though Compromise could become pair-beaten by Favorite because you
>> raise Favorite to top with Compromise, resulting in a cycle instead of a
>> CWv win for Favorite, the cycle will be judged by approvals, and you're
>> approved only your strong top-set.
>>
>> Of course, just because Favorite was almost the CWv doesn't necessarily
>> mean that s/he'll win the Approval count. But are you any worse off than
>> you'd have been with MDDA?
>>
>> Forest (but maybe others too) has proposed a number of methods that
>> combine pairwise-count and Approval. Do any of those beat MDDA &
>> Smith//Approval by the standards of protecting one's strong top-set, and
>> Middle1 & Middle2?
>>
>> in particular, do any of them do better than MDDA by those standards? Do
>> any do as well as MDDA by those standards and have as brief a defintion, or
>> nearly as brief a definition?
>>
>> In other words, are there methods that achieve those things better than
>> MDDA & Smith//Approval, or achieve them better than MDDA and have as brief
>> a definition?
>>
>> In fact, is there a method that meets FBC (or doesn't need it), meets CD,
>> and does as well by Middle1 & Middle2 as MDDA, Smith//Approval or Bucklin?
>>
>> Michael Ossipoff
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
MO
Michael Ossipoff
Thu, Nov 17, 2016 6:28 AM
I said:
"But, especially if the method wouldn't always be used in that way, MDDA
would be a lot safer from an embarrassing & bad result due to its poor
protection from burial."
I meant:
"...a lot safter from an embarrassing & bad result like the one that could
happen in MDDTR, due to its poor protection from burial."
Michael Ossipoff
On Wed, Nov 16, 2016 at 9:21 PM, Michael Ossipoff email9648742@gmail.com
wrote:
Alright, thanks! That answers my question about how one of your
Approval/Pairwise proposals (Pairwise-Sorted Approval) relate to these
goals, and it means that, there's a good,brief and natural definition
that's equivalent to Smith//Approval.
That's briefly-defined enough to be in the list of methods that should be
offered to the public and to the initiative proposal committee when a
voting-system reform is being considered.
Your other Approval/Pairwise method that I remember, the Approval
Cover-Ladder method, is probably too complicated though.
I'm looking at some of the old proposals, including MDDA, MDDTR, MAMPO,
MMD-Bucklin, etc, that might do well by the standards that I spoke of.
I personally prefer MDDTR to MDDA, if people only use below-top ranking
when absolutely necessary in a chicken-dilemma situation. ...because I'd
rather have CD than routine use of middle ranking.
But, especially if the method wouldn't always be used in that way, MDDA
would be a lot safer from an embarrassing & bad result due to its poor
protection from burial.
Michael Ossipoff
On Wed, Nov 16, 2016 at 5:30 PM, Forest Simmons fsimmons@pcc.edu wrote:
Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without having
to mention the Smith set:
List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate higher in
the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order adjacent members.
When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate at
the top of the list.
Note that the winner will automatically be a member of the top cycle, and
if it is a cycle of three, it will be the most approved member of the cycle.
Also notice that it yields an unambiguous social order, and that there
can be no second place complaint.
On Tue, Nov 15, 2016 at 5:19 PM, Michael Ossipoff <email9648742@gmail.com
When I started my current EM participation, I was saying that 3-Slot ICT
was my favorite method.
That doesn't conflict with saying that I consider Approval the best,
because I regard 3-Slot ICT, or unlimited-rankings ICT (when used
approval-like) as an Approval version without chicken-dilemma.
Later I realized that MDDTR is better than ICT, because it gives better
protection to middle candidates.
I measure that protection by how well they'd be protected if they were
CWs. ...what it would take to protect their win, and how well it's
protected.
I define "middle candidates" as candidates you rank or rate below top
and above bottom.
ICT gives no protection to middle candidates, against burial, or even
against innocent, non-strategic truncation--the two things that threaten a
CWs in pairwise-c0unt methods.
MDDTR gives full truncation-proofness to middle candidates, but
(contrary to what I earlier believed), its protection of middle candidates
against burial can only be called "shabby".
By the way, I no longer think that ICT or MDDTR needs to be 3-slot.
3-Slot would be fine with me, because I believe that ICT or MDDTR should be
used as Approval, and that middle rating or ranking should only be used
when seriously needed to deter chicken-dilemma defection. When middle is
used in an unlimited-ranking MDDTR or ICT, it should probably consist of
2nd-place ranking, if you want to give the demoted candidates the best
protection. ...but maybe you'd rather rank them with respect to
eachother, at different middle levels, as I probably sometimes would.
But, as I've been saying, activists & organizations seem to like
rankings, and some people--overcompromisers & rival parties--might very
well need rankings to soften their voting errors.
And it seems to me that there's no particular reason not to rank, in
order of preference, your middle candidates, if some of them are better
than others, or if the voters of some of them are less trustworthy than
others.
So, that's if you want CD, in addition to FBC, and good protection for
middle candidates
Even if you're using the method as Approval, you still want your demoted
candidate(s) to be well protected. Just because you don't trust hir voters
doesn't mean you want to throw her to the hounds and thereby lower Pt, the
probability of electing from your strong top-set.
Anyway, so far, this is all referring to CD methods.
Of those, I like MDDTR best. As a rank method, it (as i said) gives only
shabby burial-protection to a middle candidate. But evidently (please tell
me it isn't so) you can't have FBC, CD, and good protection of middle
candidates.
I consider CD more important to how well protected middle candidates
are. Yes, FBC + CD give poor protection to middle candidates, and that
lessens the value of their CD. But non-CD methods don't have CD at all, and
that's worse.
So I prefer MDDTR to methods that give better protection to middle
candidates, but don't have CD.
So, where I used to say that my favorite method is 3-Slot ICT, now I say
that my favorite method is MDDTR. Preferably with unlimited rankings.
(Though one could use only the 1st, 2nd, & bottom positions if one chose
to). ...regardable as a chicken-dilemma-free version of Approval.
Non-CD methods with better "middle-strategy" than CD methods:
But, in an election, I'm just one voter, and so, how well-suited the
method is to me is less important, and won't affect the outcome as much, in
comparison to how well-suited the method is to lots of progressives.
So, what if most progressives would rather have a method that's really
good as a rank method, a method that has good "middle strategy" (strategy
for protecting a middle candidate's win if s/he's CWs).
That would be important if you knew that all or nearly all, or even most
of them were going to use the method purely as a rank method.
Bucklin is the traditional FBC rankings-method.
I distinguish 2 kinds of middle strategy merit:
-
How well the method protects top-ranked candidates against
middle-ranked candidates. I call that "Middle1"
-
How well the lmethod protects a middle-ranked candidate against any
candidate you rank lower than hir. I call that "Middle2".
So, how to get the best middle strategy, with the main goal still being
keeping a good probability, Pt, of electing from your strong top-set?
MDDTR's middle1 seems better than that of Bucklin. In MDDTR, you're
voting to contribute to a majority for your top against your middle. In
Bucklin, you can protect top against middle by skipping some rating-levels
above the middle candidates. In that way, you can give the top candidates
time to receive the coalescing lower-choice votes that they'll get from the
preferrers of other candidates, before giving anything to the middle
candidates.
That's a bit more work than just ranking in order of preference. It
requires you to judge where, and how far down in rankings, your top
candidates are going to receive lower-choice votes from.
So I suggest that MDDTR does better at Middle1 than Bucklin does.
But Bucklin does better at Middle2.
In Bucklin, the CWs's win is protected by the people who pretty-much
agree with you, the people of your wing, merely not ranking down too far.
MDDTR needs that too, but it isn't enough to give MDDTR more than shabby
protection.
...And Bucklin's Middle1, though not as convenient or easy as that of
MDDTR, isn't as questionable as MDDTR's Middle2.
So, overall, I'd say that Bucklin's Middle Strategy is better than that
of MDDTR. So, for people who want to use the method purely as a
rank-method, Bucklin is better than MDDTR.
Bucklin also has the advantage of use-precedent. MDDT has the advantage
of precinct-summability,but I don't consider that essential.
For voters using the method purely as a rank method, I'd prefer Bucklin
to MDDTR.
Chicken dilemma won't happen all the time, probably won't happen often.
But middle-protection will always matter to people using it as a rank
method.
But it seems to me that, once we give up CD (for voters who need good
middle strategly, because of their rank voting), then it might be possible
to do better than Bucklin.
It seems to me that methods that use both Approval and pairwise-count
can do better than Bucklin, at middle protection.
A lot of methods of that kind have been proposed, and I've ignored all
of them because they don't meet CD. But, as mentioned above, for some
electorates, middle strategy could be more important.
It seems to me that MDDA (also evidently named MPOA) and Smith//Approval
are two methods that might be better than Bucklin at middle protection..
Using Approval as the cycle-solution is a very powerful idea (if you're
willing to give up CD, for an electorate's needs). But most of you already
knew that, before I paid attention to it (...because I was only looking at
CD methods)..
MDDA's & Smith//Approval's burial vulnerability doesn't matter much,
when the Approval winner wins the cycle. In fact, Smith//Approval's
truncation-vulnerability could even be regarded as an advantage, for when
your strong top-set doesn't include the CWs.
MDDA & Smith//Approval look better to me than Bucklin.
Simpler Middle1.
Precinct-Summability is an added bonus.
MDDA seems to have a briefer definition than either Bucklin or
Smith//Approval, and brief definition can be decisive.
I know of Bucklin being rejected when MDDTR was accepted. MDDA would
almost surely have been accepted too.
I don't think Smith//Approval would go over well, with its need to
define the Smith set, which greatly lengthens the definition.
For an electorate that need good Middle1 & Middle2 more than CD, MDDA
seems the winner so far.
Smith//Approvsl of course meets Smith. ...which of course means that it
fails FBC. But does it need FBC?
It could be argued (but I don't know if it's true) that Smith//Approval
doesn't need FBC, because, though you don't have an efffective Approval
vote at the top, you still can vote Approval, with the approval-cutoff, or
by only ranking your strong top-set.
So, though Compromise could become pair-beaten by Favorite because you
raise Favorite to top with Compromise, resulting in a cycle instead of a
CWv win for Favorite, the cycle will be judged by approvals, and you're
approved only your strong top-set.
Of course, just because Favorite was almost the CWv doesn't necessarily
mean that s/he'll win the Approval count. But are you any worse off than
you'd have been with MDDA?
Forest (but maybe others too) has proposed a number of methods that
combine pairwise-count and Approval. Do any of those beat MDDA &
Smith//Approval by the standards of protecting one's strong top-set, and
Middle1 & Middle2?
in particular, do any of them do better than MDDA by those standards? Do
any do as well as MDDA by those standards and have as brief a defintion, or
nearly as brief a definition?
In other words, are there methods that achieve those things better than
MDDA & Smith//Approval, or achieve them better than MDDA and have as brief
a definition?
In fact, is there a method that meets FBC (or doesn't need it), meets
CD, and does as well by Middle1 & Middle2 as MDDA, Smith//Approval or
Bucklin?
Michael Ossipoff
I said:
"But, especially if the method wouldn't always be used in that way, MDDA
would be a lot safer from an embarrassing & bad result due to its poor
protection from burial."
I meant:
"...a lot safter from an embarrassing & bad result like the one that could
happen in MDDTR, due to its poor protection from burial."
Michael Ossipoff
On Wed, Nov 16, 2016 at 9:21 PM, Michael Ossipoff <email9648742@gmail.com>
wrote:
> Alright, thanks! That answers my question about how one of your
> Approval/Pairwise proposals (Pairwise-Sorted Approval) relate to these
> goals, and it means that, there's a good,brief and natural definition
> that's equivalent to Smith//Approval.
>
> That's briefly-defined enough to be in the list of methods that should be
> offered to the public and to the initiative proposal committee when a
> voting-system reform is being considered.
>
> Your other Approval/Pairwise method that I remember, the Approval
> Cover-Ladder method, is probably too complicated though.
>
> I'm looking at some of the old proposals, including MDDA, MDDTR, MAMPO,
> MMD-Bucklin, etc, that might do well by the standards that I spoke of.
>
> I personally prefer MDDTR to MDDA, if people only use below-top ranking
> when absolutely necessary in a chicken-dilemma situation. ...because I'd
> rather have CD than routine use of middle ranking.
>
> But, especially if the method wouldn't always be used in that way, MDDA
> would be a lot safer from an embarrassing & bad result due to its poor
> protection from burial.
>
> Michael Ossipoff
>
>
>
> On Wed, Nov 16, 2016 at 5:30 PM, Forest Simmons <fsimmons@pcc.edu> wrote:
>
>> Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without having
>> to mention the Smith set:
>>
>> List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
>> bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate higher in
>> the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order adjacent members.
>>
>> When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate at
>> the top of the list.
>>
>> Note that the winner will automatically be a member of the top cycle, and
>> if it is a cycle of three, it will be the most approved member of the cycle.
>>
>> Also notice that it yields an unambiguous social order, and that there
>> can be no second place complaint.
>>
>> On Tue, Nov 15, 2016 at 5:19 PM, Michael Ossipoff <email9648742@gmail.com
>> > wrote:
>>
>>> When I started my current EM participation, I was saying that 3-Slot ICT
>>> was my favorite method.
>>>
>>> That doesn't conflict with saying that I consider Approval the best,
>>> because I regard 3-Slot ICT, or unlimited-rankings ICT (when used
>>> approval-like) as an Approval version without chicken-dilemma.
>>>
>>> Later I realized that MDDTR is better than ICT, because it gives better
>>> protection to middle candidates.
>>>
>>> I measure that protection by how well they'd be protected if they were
>>> CWs. ...what it would take to protect their win, and how well it's
>>> protected.
>>>
>>> I define "middle candidates" as candidates you rank or rate below top
>>> and above bottom.
>>>
>>> ICT gives no protection to middle candidates, against burial, or even
>>> against innocent, non-strategic truncation--the two things that threaten a
>>> CWs in pairwise-c0unt methods.
>>>
>>> MDDTR gives full truncation-proofness to middle candidates, but
>>> (contrary to what I earlier believed), its protection of middle candidates
>>> against burial can only be called "shabby".
>>>
>>> By the way, I no longer think that ICT or MDDTR needs to be 3-slot.
>>> 3-Slot would be fine with me, because I believe that ICT or MDDTR should be
>>> used as Approval, and that middle rating or ranking should only be used
>>> when seriously needed to deter chicken-dilemma defection. When middle is
>>> used in an unlimited-ranking MDDTR or ICT, it should probably consist of
>>> 2nd-place ranking, if you want to give the demoted candidates the best
>>> protection. ...but maybe you'd rather rank them with respect to
>>> eachother, at different middle levels, as I probably sometimes would.
>>>
>>> But, as I've been saying, activists & organizations seem to like
>>> rankings, and some people--overcompromisers & rival parties--might very
>>> well need rankings to soften their voting errors.
>>>
>>> And it seems to me that there's no particular reason not to rank, in
>>> order of preference, your middle candidates, if some of them are better
>>> than others, or if the voters of some of them are less trustworthy than
>>> others.
>>>
>>> So, that's if you want CD, in addition to FBC, and good protection for
>>> middle candidates
>>>
>>> Even if you're using the method as Approval, you still want your demoted
>>> candidate(s) to be well protected. Just because you don't trust hir voters
>>> doesn't mean you want to throw her to the hounds and thereby lower Pt, the
>>> probability of electing from your strong top-set.
>>>
>>> Anyway, so far, this is all referring to CD methods.
>>>
>>> Of those, I like MDDTR best. As a rank method, it (as i said) gives only
>>> shabby burial-protection to a middle candidate. But evidently (please tell
>>> me it isn't so) you can't have FBC, CD, and good protection of middle
>>> candidates.
>>>
>>> I consider CD more important to how well protected middle candidates
>>> are. Yes, FBC + CD give poor protection to middle candidates, and that
>>> lessens the value of their CD. But non-CD methods don't have CD at all, and
>>> that's worse.
>>>
>>> So I prefer MDDTR to methods that give better protection to middle
>>> candidates, but don't have CD.
>>>
>>> So, where I used to say that my favorite method is 3-Slot ICT, now I say
>>> that my favorite method is MDDTR. Preferably with unlimited rankings.
>>> (Though one could use only the 1st, 2nd, & bottom positions if one chose
>>> to). ...regardable as a chicken-dilemma-free version of Approval.
>>>
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>
>>> Non-CD methods with better "middle-strategy" than CD methods:
>>>
>>> But, in an election, I'm just one voter, and so, how well-suited the
>>> method is to me is less important, and won't affect the outcome as much, in
>>> comparison to how well-suited the method is to lots of progressives.
>>>
>>> So, what if most progressives would rather have a method that's really
>>> good as a rank method, a method that has good "middle strategy" (strategy
>>> for protecting a middle candidate's win if s/he's CWs).
>>>
>>> That would be important if you knew that all or nearly all, or even most
>>> of them were going to use the method purely as a rank method.
>>>
>>> Bucklin is the traditional FBC rankings-method.
>>>
>>> I distinguish 2 kinds of middle strategy merit:
>>>
>>> 1. How well the method protects top-ranked candidates against
>>> middle-ranked candidates. I call that "Middle1"
>>>
>>> 2. How well the lmethod protects a middle-ranked candidate against any
>>> candidate you rank lower than hir. I call that "Middle2".
>>>
>>> So, how to get the best middle strategy, with the main goal still being
>>> keeping a good probability, Pt, of electing from your strong top-set?
>>>
>>> MDDTR's middle1 seems better than that of Bucklin. In MDDTR, you're
>>> voting to contribute to a majority for your top against your middle. In
>>> Bucklin, you can protect top against middle by skipping some rating-levels
>>> above the middle candidates. In that way, you can give the top candidates
>>> time to receive the coalescing lower-choice votes that they'll get from the
>>> preferrers of other candidates, before giving anything to the middle
>>> candidates.
>>>
>>> That's a bit more work than just ranking in order of preference. It
>>> requires you to judge where, and how far down in rankings, your top
>>> candidates are going to receive lower-choice votes from.
>>>
>>> So I suggest that MDDTR does better at Middle1 than Bucklin does.
>>>
>>> But Bucklin does better at Middle2.
>>>
>>> In Bucklin, the CWs's win is protected by the people who pretty-much
>>> agree with you, the people of your wing, merely not ranking down too far.
>>>
>>> MDDTR needs that too, but it isn't enough to give MDDTR more than shabby
>>> protection.
>>>
>>> ...And Bucklin's Middle1, though not as convenient or easy as that of
>>> MDDTR, isn't as questionable as MDDTR's Middle2.
>>>
>>> So, overall, I'd say that Bucklin's Middle Strategy is better than that
>>> of MDDTR. So, for people who want to use the method purely as a
>>> rank-method, Bucklin is better than MDDTR.
>>>
>>> Bucklin also has the advantage of use-precedent. MDDT has the advantage
>>> of precinct-summability,but I don't consider that essential.
>>>
>>> For voters using the method purely as a rank method, I'd prefer Bucklin
>>> to MDDTR.
>>>
>>> Chicken dilemma won't happen all the time, probably won't happen often.
>>> But middle-protection will always matter to people using it as a rank
>>> method.
>>>
>>> But it seems to me that, once we give up CD (for voters who need good
>>> middle strategly, because of their rank voting), then it might be possible
>>> to do better than Bucklin.
>>>
>>> It seems to me that methods that use both Approval and pairwise-count
>>> can do better than Bucklin, at middle protection.
>>>
>>> A lot of methods of that kind have been proposed, and I've ignored all
>>> of them because they don't meet CD. But, as mentioned above, for some
>>> electorates, middle strategy could be more important.
>>>
>>> It seems to me that MDDA (also evidently named MPOA) and Smith//Approval
>>> are two methods that might be better than Bucklin at middle protection..
>>>
>>> Using Approval as the cycle-solution is a very powerful idea (if you're
>>> willing to give up CD, for an electorate's needs). But most of you already
>>> knew that, before I paid attention to it (...because I was only looking at
>>> CD methods)..
>>>
>>> MDDA's & Smith//Approval's burial vulnerability doesn't matter much,
>>> when the Approval winner wins the cycle. In fact, Smith//Approval's
>>> truncation-vulnerability could even be regarded as an advantage, for when
>>> your strong top-set doesn't include the CWs.
>>>
>>> MDDA & Smith//Approval look better to me than Bucklin.
>>>
>>> Simpler Middle1.
>>>
>>> Precinct-Summability is an added bonus.
>>>
>>> MDDA seems to have a briefer definition than either Bucklin or
>>> Smith//Approval, and brief definition can be decisive.
>>>
>>> I know of Bucklin being rejected when MDDTR was accepted. MDDA would
>>> almost surely have been accepted too.
>>>
>>> I don't think Smith//Approval would go over well, with its need to
>>> define the Smith set, which greatly lengthens the definition.
>>>
>>> For an electorate that need good Middle1 & Middle2 more than CD, MDDA
>>> seems the winner so far.
>>>
>>> Smith//Approvsl of course meets Smith. ...which of course means that it
>>> fails FBC. But does it need FBC?
>>>
>>> It could be argued (but I don't know if it's true) that Smith//Approval
>>> doesn't need FBC, because, though you don't have an efffective Approval
>>> vote at the top, you still can vote Approval, with the approval-cutoff, or
>>> by only ranking your strong top-set.
>>>
>>> So, though Compromise could become pair-beaten by Favorite because you
>>> raise Favorite to top with Compromise, resulting in a cycle instead of a
>>> CWv win for Favorite, the cycle will be judged by approvals, and you're
>>> approved only your strong top-set.
>>>
>>> Of course, just because Favorite was almost the CWv doesn't necessarily
>>> mean that s/he'll win the Approval count. But are you any worse off than
>>> you'd have been with MDDA?
>>>
>>> Forest (but maybe others too) has proposed a number of methods that
>>> combine pairwise-count and Approval. Do any of those beat MDDA &
>>> Smith//Approval by the standards of protecting one's strong top-set, and
>>> Middle1 & Middle2?
>>>
>>> in particular, do any of them do better than MDDA by those standards? Do
>>> any do as well as MDDA by those standards and have as brief a defintion, or
>>> nearly as brief a definition?
>>>
>>> In other words, are there methods that achieve those things better than
>>> MDDA & Smith//Approval, or achieve them better than MDDA and have as brief
>>> a definition?
>>>
>>> In fact, is there a method that meets FBC (or doesn't need it), meets
>>> CD, and does as well by Middle1 & Middle2 as MDDA, Smith//Approval or
>>> Bucklin?
>>>
>>> Michael Ossipoff
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>
C
C.Benham
Thu, Nov 17, 2016 2:05 PM
On 11/17/2016 9:00 AM, Forest Simmons wrote:
Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without
having to mention the Smith set:
List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate
higher in the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order
adjacent members.
When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate
at the top of the list.
Forest,
I like Smith//Approval and your usually equivalent Max Covered Approval
method.
But in this version, the stipulation that we "switch places of the two
/lowest/ out of order adjacent members" could look a bit arbitrary and
less smooth
than Margins-Sorted Approval.
BTW, it seems to me that both this and Smith//Approval can handle the
Chicken Dilemma situation quite well if we use ranked ballots with
approval cut-offs.
(Or ratings ballots with many slots that register approval and as many
(or maybe as few as only 2) that register unapproval.)
http://wiki.electorama.com/wiki/Approval_Sorted_Margins
http://wiki.electorama.com/wiki/Approval_Cutoff
And here's another smooth Condorcet method that should do as well:
*Voters score the candidates on some scale that allows large and varied
gaps between the candidates: say 0-100.
Elect the CW if there is one.
Otherwise compress the 1-point gaps (if any) on all ballots into
zero-point gaps (so that those ballots abandon their original pairwise
preference for any
X originally scored only one point more than any Y).
Based on the thus modified ballot information, elect the CW if there is one.
Otherwise compress the 2-point gaps (if any) on all ballots into
zero-point gaps (so that those ballots abandon their original pairwise
preference for any
X originally scored two points more than any Y).
Based on the thus modified ballot information, elect the CW if there is one.
And so on, as gradually as possible compressing larger and larger gaps
until we have a pairwise beats-all winner.*
Chris Benham
On 11/17/2016 9:00 AM, Forest Simmons wrote:
Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without
having to mention the Smith set:
List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate
higher in the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order
adjacent members.
When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate
at the top of the list.
Note that the winner will automatically be a member of the top cycle,
and if it is a cycle of three, it will be the most approved member of
the cycle.
Also notice that it yields an unambiguous social order, and that there
can be no second place complaint.
On Tue, Nov 15, 2016 at 5:19 PM, Michael Ossipoff
<email9648742@gmail.com mailto:email9648742@gmail.com> wrote:
When I started my current EM participation, I was saying that
3-Slot ICT was my favorite method.
That doesn't conflict with saying that I consider Approval the
best, because I regard 3-Slot ICT, or unlimited-rankings ICT (when
used approval-like) as an Approval version without chicken-dilemma.
Later I realized that MDDTR is better than ICT, because it gives
better protection to middle candidates.
I measure that protection by how well they'd be protected if they
were CWs. ...what it would take to protect their win, and how
well it's protected.
I define "middle candidates" as candidates you rank or rate below
top and above bottom.
ICT gives no protection to middle candidates, against burial, or
even against innocent, non-strategic truncation--the two things
that threaten a CWs in pairwise-c0unt methods.
MDDTR gives full truncation-proofness to middle candidates, but
(contrary to what I earlier believed), its protection of middle
candidates against burial can only be called "shabby".
By the way, I no longer think that ICT or MDDTR needs to be
3-slot. 3-Slot would be fine with me, because I believe that ICT
or MDDTR should be used as Approval, and that middle rating or
ranking should only be used when seriously needed to deter
chicken-dilemma defection. When middle is used in an
unlimited-ranking MDDTR or ICT, it should probably consist of
2nd-place ranking, if you want to give the demoted candidates the
best protection. ...but maybe you'd rather rank them with
respect to eachother, at different middle levels, as I probably
sometimes would.
But, as I've been saying, activists & organizations seem to like
rankings, and some people--overcompromisers & rival parties--might
very well need rankings to soften their voting errors.
And it seems to me that there's no particular reason not to rank,
in order of preference, your middle candidates, if some of them
are better than others, or if the voters of some of them are less
trustworthy than others.
So, that's if you want CD, in addition to FBC, and good protection
for middle candidates
Even if you're using the method as Approval, you still want your
demoted candidate(s) to be well protected. Just because you don't
trust hir voters doesn't mean you want to throw her to the hounds
and thereby lower Pt, the probability of electing from your strong
top-set.
Anyway, so far, this is all referring to CD methods.
Of those, I like MDDTR best. As a rank method, it (as i said)
gives only shabby burial-protection to a middle candidate. But
evidently (please tell me it isn't so) you can't have FBC, CD, and
good protection of middle candidates.
I consider CD more important to how well protected middle
candidates are. Yes, FBC + CD give poor protection to middle
candidates, and that lessens the value of their CD. But non-CD
methods don't have CD at all, and that's worse.
So I prefer MDDTR to methods that give better protection to middle
candidates, but don't have CD.
So, where I used to say that my favorite method is 3-Slot ICT, now
I say that my favorite method is MDDTR. Preferably with unlimited
rankings. (Though one could use only the 1st, 2nd, & bottom
positions if one chose to). ...regardable as a
chicken-dilemma-free version of Approval.
------------------------------------------------------------------
Non-CD methods with better "middle-strategy" than CD methods:
But, in an election, I'm just one voter, and so, how well-suited
the method is to me is less important, and won't affect the
outcome as much, in comparison to how well-suited the method is to
lots of progressives.
So, what if most progressives would rather have a method that's
really good as a rank method, a method that has good "middle
strategy" (strategy for protecting a middle candidate's win if
s/he's CWs).
That would be important if you knew that all or nearly all, or
even most of them were going to use the method purely as a rank
method.
Bucklin is the traditional FBC rankings-method.
I distinguish 2 kinds of middle strategy merit:
1. How well the method protects top-ranked candidates against
middle-ranked candidates. I call that "Middle1"
2. How well the lmethod protects a middle-ranked candidate
against any candidate you rank lower than hir. I call that "Middle2".
So, how to get the best middle strategy, with the main goal still
being keeping a good probability, Pt, of electing from your strong
top-set?
MDDTR's middle1 seems better than that of Bucklin. In MDDTR,
you're voting to contribute to a majority for your top against
your middle. In Bucklin, you can protect top against middle by
skipping some rating-levels above the middle candidates. In that
way, you can give the top candidates time to receive the
coalescing lower-choice votes that they'll get from the preferrers
of other candidates, before giving anything to the middle candidates.
That's a bit more work than just ranking in order of preference.
It requires you to judge where, and how far down in rankings, your
top candidates are going to receive lower-choice votes from.
So I suggest that MDDTR does better at Middle1 than Bucklin does.
But Bucklin does better at Middle2.
In Bucklin, the CWs's win is protected by the people who
pretty-much agree with you, the people of your wing, merely not
ranking down too far.
MDDTR needs that too, but it isn't enough to give MDDTR more than
shabby protection.
...And Bucklin's Middle1, though not as convenient or easy as that
of MDDTR, isn't as questionable as MDDTR's Middle2.
So, overall, I'd say that Bucklin's Middle Strategy is better than
that of MDDTR. So, for people who want to use the method purely as
a rank-method, Bucklin is better than MDDTR.
Bucklin also has the advantage of use-precedent. MDDT has the
advantage of precinct-summability,but I don't consider that
essential.
For voters using the method purely as a rank method, I'd prefer
Bucklin to MDDTR.
Chicken dilemma won't happen all the time, probably won't happen
often. But middle-protection will always matter to people using it
as a rank method.
But it seems to me that, once we give up CD (for voters who need
good middle strategly, because of their rank voting), then it
might be possible to do better than Bucklin.
It seems to me that methods that use both Approval and
pairwise-count can do better than Bucklin, at middle protection.
A lot of methods of that kind have been proposed, and I've ignored
all of them because they don't meet CD. But, as mentioned above,
for some electorates, middle strategy could be more important.
It seems to me that MDDA (also evidently named MPOA) and
Smith//Approval are two methods that might be better than Bucklin
at middle protection..
Using Approval as the cycle-solution is a very powerful idea (if
you're willing to give up CD, for an electorate's needs). But most
of you already knew that, before I paid attention to it
(...because I was only looking at CD methods)..
MDDA's & Smith//Approval's burial vulnerability doesn't matter
much, when the Approval winner wins the cycle. In fact,
Smith//Approval's truncation-vulnerability could even be regarded
as an advantage, for when your strong top-set doesn't include the CWs.
MDDA & Smith//Approval look better to me than Bucklin.
Simpler Middle1.
Precinct-Summability is an added bonus.
MDDA seems to have a briefer definition than either Bucklin or
Smith//Approval, and brief definition can be decisive.
I know of Bucklin being rejected when MDDTR was accepted. MDDA
would almost surely have been accepted too.
I don't think Smith//Approval would go over well, with its need
to define the Smith set, which greatly lengthens the definition.
For an electorate that need good Middle1 & Middle2 more than CD,
MDDA seems the winner so far.
Smith//Approvsl of course meets Smith. ...which of course means
that it fails FBC. But does it need FBC?
It could be argued (but I don't know if it's true) that
Smith//Approval doesn't need FBC, because, though you don't have
an efffective Approval vote at the top, you still can vote
Approval, with the approval-cutoff, or by only ranking your strong
top-set.
So, though Compromise could become pair-beaten by Favorite because
you raise Favorite to top with Compromise, resulting in a cycle
instead of a CWv win for Favorite, the cycle will be judged by
approvals, and you're approved only your strong top-set.
Of course, just because Favorite was almost the CWv doesn't
necessarily mean that s/he'll win the Approval count. But are you
any worse off than you'd have been with MDDA?
Forest (but maybe others too) has proposed a number of methods
that combine pairwise-count and Approval. Do any of those beat
MDDA & Smith//Approval by the standards of protecting one's strong
top-set, and Middle1 & Middle2?
in particular, do any of them do better than MDDA by those
standards? Do any do as well as MDDA by those standards and have
as brief a defintion, or nearly as brief a definition?
In other words, are there methods that achieve those things better
than MDDA & Smith//Approval, or achieve them better than MDDA and
have as brief a definition?
In fact, is there a method that meets FBC (or doesn't need it),
meets CD, and does as well by Middle1 & Middle2 as MDDA,
Smith//Approval or Bucklin?
Michael Ossipoff
On 11/17/2016 9:00 AM, Forest Simmons wrote:
> Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without
> having to mention the Smith set:
>
> List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
> bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate
> higher in the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order
> adjacent members.
>
> When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate
> at the top of the list.
Forest,
I like Smith//Approval and your usually equivalent Max Covered Approval
method.
But in this version, the stipulation that we "switch places of the two
/lowest/ out of order adjacent members" could look a bit arbitrary and
less smooth
than Margins-Sorted Approval.
BTW, it seems to me that both this and Smith//Approval can handle the
Chicken Dilemma situation quite well if we use ranked ballots with
approval cut-offs.
(Or ratings ballots with many slots that register approval and as many
(or maybe as few as only 2) that register unapproval.)
http://wiki.electorama.com/wiki/Approval_Sorted_Margins
http://wiki.electorama.com/wiki/Approval_Cutoff
And here's another smooth Condorcet method that should do as well:
*Voters score the candidates on some scale that allows large and varied
gaps between the candidates: say 0-100.
Elect the CW if there is one.
Otherwise compress the 1-point gaps (if any) on all ballots into
zero-point gaps (so that those ballots abandon their original pairwise
preference for any
X originally scored only one point more than any Y).
Based on the thus modified ballot information, elect the CW if there is one.
Otherwise compress the 2-point gaps (if any) on all ballots into
zero-point gaps (so that those ballots abandon their original pairwise
preference for any
X originally scored two points more than any Y).
Based on the thus modified ballot information, elect the CW if there is one.
And so on, as gradually as possible compressing larger and larger gaps
until we have a pairwise beats-all winner.*
Chris Benham
On 11/17/2016 9:00 AM, Forest Simmons wrote:
> Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without
> having to mention the Smith set:
>
> List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
> bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate
> higher in the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order
> adjacent members.
>
> When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate
> at the top of the list.
>
> Note that the winner will automatically be a member of the top cycle,
> and if it is a cycle of three, it will be the most approved member of
> the cycle.
>
> Also notice that it yields an unambiguous social order, and that there
> can be no second place complaint.
>
>
>
>
>
> On Tue, Nov 15, 2016 at 5:19 PM, Michael Ossipoff
> <email9648742@gmail.com <mailto:email9648742@gmail.com>> wrote:
>
> When I started my current EM participation, I was saying that
> 3-Slot ICT was my favorite method.
>
> That doesn't conflict with saying that I consider Approval the
> best, because I regard 3-Slot ICT, or unlimited-rankings ICT (when
> used approval-like) as an Approval version without chicken-dilemma.
>
> Later I realized that MDDTR is better than ICT, because it gives
> better protection to middle candidates.
>
> I measure that protection by how well they'd be protected if they
> were CWs. ...what it would take to protect their win, and how
> well it's protected.
>
> I define "middle candidates" as candidates you rank or rate below
> top and above bottom.
>
> ICT gives no protection to middle candidates, against burial, or
> even against innocent, non-strategic truncation--the two things
> that threaten a CWs in pairwise-c0unt methods.
>
> MDDTR gives full truncation-proofness to middle candidates, but
> (contrary to what I earlier believed), its protection of middle
> candidates against burial can only be called "shabby".
>
> By the way, I no longer think that ICT or MDDTR needs to be
> 3-slot. 3-Slot would be fine with me, because I believe that ICT
> or MDDTR should be used as Approval, and that middle rating or
> ranking should only be used when seriously needed to deter
> chicken-dilemma defection. When middle is used in an
> unlimited-ranking MDDTR or ICT, it should probably consist of
> 2nd-place ranking, if you want to give the demoted candidates the
> best protection. ...but maybe you'd rather rank them with
> respect to eachother, at different middle levels, as I probably
> sometimes would.
>
> But, as I've been saying, activists & organizations seem to like
> rankings, and some people--overcompromisers & rival parties--might
> very well need rankings to soften their voting errors.
>
> And it seems to me that there's no particular reason not to rank,
> in order of preference, your middle candidates, if some of them
> are better than others, or if the voters of some of them are less
> trustworthy than others.
>
> So, that's if you want CD, in addition to FBC, and good protection
> for middle candidates
>
> Even if you're using the method as Approval, you still want your
> demoted candidate(s) to be well protected. Just because you don't
> trust hir voters doesn't mean you want to throw her to the hounds
> and thereby lower Pt, the probability of electing from your strong
> top-set.
>
> Anyway, so far, this is all referring to CD methods.
>
> Of those, I like MDDTR best. As a rank method, it (as i said)
> gives only shabby burial-protection to a middle candidate. But
> evidently (please tell me it isn't so) you can't have FBC, CD, and
> good protection of middle candidates.
>
> I consider CD more important to how well protected middle
> candidates are. Yes, FBC + CD give poor protection to middle
> candidates, and that lessens the value of their CD. But non-CD
> methods don't have CD at all, and that's worse.
>
> So I prefer MDDTR to methods that give better protection to middle
> candidates, but don't have CD.
>
> So, where I used to say that my favorite method is 3-Slot ICT, now
> I say that my favorite method is MDDTR. Preferably with unlimited
> rankings. (Though one could use only the 1st, 2nd, & bottom
> positions if one chose to). ...regardable as a
> chicken-dilemma-free version of Approval.
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Non-CD methods with better "middle-strategy" than CD methods:
>
> But, in an election, I'm just one voter, and so, how well-suited
> the method is to me is less important, and won't affect the
> outcome as much, in comparison to how well-suited the method is to
> lots of progressives.
>
> So, what if most progressives would rather have a method that's
> really good as a rank method, a method that has good "middle
> strategy" (strategy for protecting a middle candidate's win if
> s/he's CWs).
>
> That would be important if you knew that all or nearly all, or
> even most of them were going to use the method purely as a rank
> method.
>
> Bucklin is the traditional FBC rankings-method.
>
> I distinguish 2 kinds of middle strategy merit:
>
> 1. How well the method protects top-ranked candidates against
> middle-ranked candidates. I call that "Middle1"
>
> 2. How well the lmethod protects a middle-ranked candidate
> against any candidate you rank lower than hir. I call that "Middle2".
>
> So, how to get the best middle strategy, with the main goal still
> being keeping a good probability, Pt, of electing from your strong
> top-set?
>
> MDDTR's middle1 seems better than that of Bucklin. In MDDTR,
> you're voting to contribute to a majority for your top against
> your middle. In Bucklin, you can protect top against middle by
> skipping some rating-levels above the middle candidates. In that
> way, you can give the top candidates time to receive the
> coalescing lower-choice votes that they'll get from the preferrers
> of other candidates, before giving anything to the middle candidates.
>
> That's a bit more work than just ranking in order of preference.
> It requires you to judge where, and how far down in rankings, your
> top candidates are going to receive lower-choice votes from.
>
> So I suggest that MDDTR does better at Middle1 than Bucklin does.
>
> But Bucklin does better at Middle2.
>
> In Bucklin, the CWs's win is protected by the people who
> pretty-much agree with you, the people of your wing, merely not
> ranking down too far.
>
> MDDTR needs that too, but it isn't enough to give MDDTR more than
> shabby protection.
>
> ...And Bucklin's Middle1, though not as convenient or easy as that
> of MDDTR, isn't as questionable as MDDTR's Middle2.
>
> So, overall, I'd say that Bucklin's Middle Strategy is better than
> that of MDDTR. So, for people who want to use the method purely as
> a rank-method, Bucklin is better than MDDTR.
>
> Bucklin also has the advantage of use-precedent. MDDT has the
> advantage of precinct-summability,but I don't consider that
> essential.
>
> For voters using the method purely as a rank method, I'd prefer
> Bucklin to MDDTR.
>
> Chicken dilemma won't happen all the time, probably won't happen
> often. But middle-protection will always matter to people using it
> as a rank method.
>
> But it seems to me that, once we give up CD (for voters who need
> good middle strategly, because of their rank voting), then it
> might be possible to do better than Bucklin.
>
> It seems to me that methods that use both Approval and
> pairwise-count can do better than Bucklin, at middle protection.
>
> A lot of methods of that kind have been proposed, and I've ignored
> all of them because they don't meet CD. But, as mentioned above,
> for some electorates, middle strategy could be more important.
>
> It seems to me that MDDA (also evidently named MPOA) and
> Smith//Approval are two methods that might be better than Bucklin
> at middle protection..
>
> Using Approval as the cycle-solution is a very powerful idea (if
> you're willing to give up CD, for an electorate's needs). But most
> of you already knew that, before I paid attention to it
> (...because I was only looking at CD methods)..
>
> MDDA's & Smith//Approval's burial vulnerability doesn't matter
> much, when the Approval winner wins the cycle. In fact,
> Smith//Approval's truncation-vulnerability could even be regarded
> as an advantage, for when your strong top-set doesn't include the CWs.
>
> MDDA & Smith//Approval look better to me than Bucklin.
>
> Simpler Middle1.
>
> Precinct-Summability is an added bonus.
>
> MDDA seems to have a briefer definition than either Bucklin or
> Smith//Approval, and brief definition can be decisive.
>
> I know of Bucklin being rejected when MDDTR was accepted. MDDA
> would almost surely have been accepted too.
>
> I don't think Smith//Approval would go over well, with its need
> to define the Smith set, which greatly lengthens the definition.
>
> For an electorate that need good Middle1 & Middle2 more than CD,
> MDDA seems the winner so far.
>
> Smith//Approvsl of course meets Smith. ...which of course means
> that it fails FBC. But does it need FBC?
>
> It could be argued (but I don't know if it's true) that
> Smith//Approval doesn't need FBC, because, though you don't have
> an efffective Approval vote at the top, you still can vote
> Approval, with the approval-cutoff, or by only ranking your strong
> top-set.
>
> So, though Compromise could become pair-beaten by Favorite because
> you raise Favorite to top with Compromise, resulting in a cycle
> instead of a CWv win for Favorite, the cycle will be judged by
> approvals, and you're approved only your strong top-set.
>
> Of course, just because Favorite was almost the CWv doesn't
> necessarily mean that s/he'll win the Approval count. But are you
> any worse off than you'd have been with MDDA?
>
> Forest (but maybe others too) has proposed a number of methods
> that combine pairwise-count and Approval. Do any of those beat
> MDDA & Smith//Approval by the standards of protecting one's strong
> top-set, and Middle1 & Middle2?
>
> in particular, do any of them do better than MDDA by those
> standards? Do any do as well as MDDA by those standards and have
> as brief a defintion, or nearly as brief a definition?
>
> In other words, are there methods that achieve those things better
> than MDDA & Smith//Approval, or achieve them better than MDDA and
> have as brief a definition?
>
> In fact, is there a method that meets FBC (or doesn't need it),
> meets CD, and does as well by Middle1 & Middle2 as MDDA,
> Smith//Approval or Bucklin?
>
> Michael Ossipoff
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
MO
Michael Ossipoff
Thu, Nov 17, 2016 6:54 PM
But wouldn't Smith//Approval, with approval cutoffs in the rankings, share
MDDTR's burial-vullnerability?
...with, additionally, vulnerability to truncation, which MDDTR doesn't
have?
And Smith//Approval trades MDDTR's FBC for Smith, which I consider an
unfavorable trade.
I now again consider Benham & Woodall to be the best proposals for an
electorate that wants &/or needs rankings...because of the IRV mitigations
that i mentioned in my previous posting, and because of the context of the
always high price of CD, as exemplified by MDDTR.
It could be debatable whether IRV's CWs elimination problem is worse than
MDDTR's burial vulnerability problem, but, because of IRV's mitigations, I
tend to feel that IRV is better, for people who want or need routine
ranking.
Myself, I personally prefer MDDTR, with middle-ranking usually avoided, but
I'm talking about what's best for the electorate as a whole.
In polls with balloting by both Approval & Score, I've observed
overcompromisers doing better with Score than with Approval. They (and
rival parties) would probably do even better with rankings.
Suggested merit-order for electorates that want &/or need rankings:
1.Benham
2. woodall
3. IRV
4. MDDTR
5. Methods combining Approval with pairwise-count
6. ER Bucklin/MJ
7. Score
8. Approval
I still personally prefer Approval, or maybe MDDTR, when used as Approval
with 2nd-ranking as a defection-deterrent. But this suggested merit-order
is for electorates who want &/or need rankings.
On pure merit, Woodall seems a bit better than Benham, because it's more
particular which Smith-set member it elects. But Benham is much briefer to
define, not needing to define or mention the Smith-set, and that makes a
big difference in proposability, which outweighs the small merit-difference.
I don't know the merit-order among the methods that combine Approval with
pairwise-count.
Maybe the ones that start with Approval are better than the ones that start
with pairwise-count.
Among those, Brams' PAV is vulnerable to truncation, where MAMPO isn't.
But maybe that's a good thing, if the majority CWs among the
majority-approved candidates isn't in your strong top-set.
A proposal that the Greens upgrade from IRV to Benham seems reasonably
proposable.
Though Benham & Woodall are vulnerable to burial & truncation, the worst
that can result from those strategies is the same as what IRV would have
done anyway.
Michael Ossipoff
On Thu, Nov 17, 2016 at 9:05 AM, C.Benham cbenham@adam.com.au wrote:
On 11/17/2016 9:00 AM, Forest Simmons wrote:
Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without having
to mention the Smith set:
List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate higher in
the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order adjacent members.
When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate at
the top of the list.
Forest,
I like Smith//Approval and your usually equivalent Max Covered Approval
method.
But in this version, the stipulation that we "switch places of the two
lowest out of order adjacent members" could look a bit arbitrary and
less smooth
than Margins-Sorted Approval.
BTW, it seems to me that both this and Smith//Approval can handle the
Chicken Dilemma situation quite well if we use ranked ballots with
approval cut-offs.
(Or ratings ballots with many slots that register approval and as many
(or maybe as few as only 2) that register unapproval.)
http://wiki.electorama.com/wiki/Approval_Sorted_Margins
http://wiki.electorama.com/wiki/Approval_Cutoff
And here's another smooth Condorcet method that should do as well:
*Voters score the candidates on some scale that allows large and varied
gaps between the candidates: say 0-100.
Elect the CW if there is one.
Otherwise compress the 1-point gaps (if any) on all ballots into
zero-point gaps (so that those ballots abandon their original pairwise
preference for any
X originally scored only one point more than any Y).
Based on the thus modified ballot information, elect the CW if there is
one.
Otherwise compress the 2-point gaps (if any) on all ballots into
zero-point gaps (so that those ballots abandon their original pairwise
preference for any
X originally scored two points more than any Y).
Based on the thus modified ballot information, elect the CW if there is
one.
And so on, as gradually as possible compressing larger and larger gaps
until we have a pairwise beats-all winner.*
Chris Benham
On 11/17/2016 9:00 AM, Forest Simmons wrote:
Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without having
to mention the Smith set:
List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate higher in
the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order adjacent members.
When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate at
the top of the list.
Note that the winner will automatically be a member of the top cycle, and
if it is a cycle of three, it will be the most approved member of the cycle.
Also notice that it yields an unambiguous social order, and that there can
be no second place complaint.
On Tue, Nov 15, 2016 at 5:19 PM, Michael Ossipoff email9648742@gmail.com
wrote:
When I started my current EM participation, I was saying that 3-Slot ICT
was my favorite method.
That doesn't conflict with saying that I consider Approval the best,
because I regard 3-Slot ICT, or unlimited-rankings ICT (when used
approval-like) as an Approval version without chicken-dilemma.
Later I realized that MDDTR is better than ICT, because it gives better
protection to middle candidates.
I measure that protection by how well they'd be protected if they were
CWs. ...what it would take to protect their win, and how well it's
protected.
I define "middle candidates" as candidates you rank or rate below top and
above bottom.
ICT gives no protection to middle candidates, against burial, or even
against innocent, non-strategic truncation--the two things that threaten a
CWs in pairwise-c0unt methods.
MDDTR gives full truncation-proofness to middle candidates, but (contrary
to what I earlier believed), its protection of middle candidates against
burial can only be called "shabby".
By the way, I no longer think that ICT or MDDTR needs to be 3-slot.
3-Slot would be fine with me, because I believe that ICT or MDDTR should be
used as Approval, and that middle rating or ranking should only be used
when seriously needed to deter chicken-dilemma defection. When middle is
used in an unlimited-ranking MDDTR or ICT, it should probably consist of
2nd-place ranking, if you want to give the demoted candidates the best
protection. ...but maybe you'd rather rank them with respect to
eachother, at different middle levels, as I probably sometimes would.
But, as I've been saying, activists & organizations seem to like
rankings, and some people--overcompromisers & rival parties--might very
well need rankings to soften their voting errors.
And it seems to me that there's no particular reason not to rank, in
order of preference, your middle candidates, if some of them are better
than others, or if the voters of some of them are less trustworthy than
others.
So, that's if you want CD, in addition to FBC, and good protection for
middle candidates
Even if you're using the method as Approval, you still want your demoted
candidate(s) to be well protected. Just because you don't trust hir voters
doesn't mean you want to throw her to the hounds and thereby lower Pt, the
probability of electing from your strong top-set.
Anyway, so far, this is all referring to CD methods.
Of those, I like MDDTR best. As a rank method, it (as i said) gives only
shabby burial-protection to a middle candidate. But evidently (please tell
me it isn't so) you can't have FBC, CD, and good protection of middle
candidates.
I consider CD more important to how well protected middle candidates are.
Yes, FBC + CD give poor protection to middle candidates, and that lessens
the value of their CD. But non-CD methods don't have CD at all, and that's
worse.
So I prefer MDDTR to methods that give better protection to middle
candidates, but don't have CD.
So, where I used to say that my favorite method is 3-Slot ICT, now I say
that my favorite method is MDDTR. Preferably with unlimited rankings.
(Though one could use only the 1st, 2nd, & bottom positions if one chose
to). ...regardable as a chicken-dilemma-free version of Approval.
Non-CD methods with better "middle-strategy" than CD methods:
But, in an election, I'm just one voter, and so, how well-suited the
method is to me is less important, and won't affect the outcome as much, in
comparison to how well-suited the method is to lots of progressives.
So, what if most progressives would rather have a method that's really
good as a rank method, a method that has good "middle strategy" (strategy
for protecting a middle candidate's win if s/he's CWs).
That would be important if you knew that all or nearly all, or even most
of them were going to use the method purely as a rank method.
Bucklin is the traditional FBC rankings-method.
I distinguish 2 kinds of middle strategy merit:
-
How well the method protects top-ranked candidates against
middle-ranked candidates. I call that "Middle1"
-
How well the lmethod protects a middle-ranked candidate against any
candidate you rank lower than hir. I call that "Middle2".
So, how to get the best middle strategy, with the main goal still being
keeping a good probability, Pt, of electing from your strong top-set?
MDDTR's middle1 seems better than that of Bucklin. In MDDTR, you're
voting to contribute to a majority for your top against your middle. In
Bucklin, you can protect top against middle by skipping some rating-levels
above the middle candidates. In that way, you can give the top candidates
time to receive the coalescing lower-choice votes that they'll get from the
preferrers of other candidates, before giving anything to the middle
candidates.
That's a bit more work than just ranking in order of preference. It
requires you to judge where, and how far down in rankings, your top
candidates are going to receive lower-choice votes from.
So I suggest that MDDTR does better at Middle1 than Bucklin does.
But Bucklin does better at Middle2.
In Bucklin, the CWs's win is protected by the people who pretty-much
agree with you, the people of your wing, merely not ranking down too far.
MDDTR needs that too, but it isn't enough to give MDDTR more than shabby
protection.
...And Bucklin's Middle1, though not as convenient or easy as that of
MDDTR, isn't as questionable as MDDTR's Middle2.
So, overall, I'd say that Bucklin's Middle Strategy is better than that
of MDDTR. So, for people who want to use the method purely as a
rank-method, Bucklin is better than MDDTR.
Bucklin also has the advantage of use-precedent. MDDT has the advantage
of precinct-summability,but I don't consider that essential.
For voters using the method purely as a rank method, I'd prefer Bucklin
to MDDTR.
Chicken dilemma won't happen all the time, probably won't happen often.
But middle-protection will always matter to people using it as a rank
method.
But it seems to me that, once we give up CD (for voters who need good
middle strategly, because of their rank voting), then it might be possible
to do better than Bucklin.
It seems to me that methods that use both Approval and pairwise-count can
do better than Bucklin, at middle protection.
A lot of methods of that kind have been proposed, and I've ignored all of
them because they don't meet CD. But, as mentioned above, for some
electorates, middle strategy could be more important.
It seems to me that MDDA (also evidently named MPOA) and Smith//Approval
are two methods that might be better than Bucklin at middle protection..
Using Approval as the cycle-solution is a very powerful idea (if you're
willing to give up CD, for an electorate's needs). But most of you already
knew that, before I paid attention to it (...because I was only looking at
CD methods)..
MDDA's & Smith//Approval's burial vulnerability doesn't matter much, when
the Approval winner wins the cycle. In fact, Smith//Approval's
truncation-vulnerability could even be regarded as an advantage, for when
your strong top-set doesn't include the CWs.
MDDA & Smith//Approval look better to me than Bucklin.
Simpler Middle1.
Precinct-Summability is an added bonus.
MDDA seems to have a briefer definition than either Bucklin or
Smith//Approval, and brief definition can be decisive.
I know of Bucklin being rejected when MDDTR was accepted. MDDA would
almost surely have been accepted too.
I don't think Smith//Approval would go over well, with its need to
define the Smith set, which greatly lengthens the definition.
For an electorate that need good Middle1 & Middle2 more than CD, MDDA
seems the winner so far.
Smith//Approvsl of course meets Smith. ...which of course means that it
fails FBC. But does it need FBC?
It could be argued (but I don't know if it's true) that Smith//Approval
doesn't need FBC, because, though you don't have an efffective Approval
vote at the top, you still can vote Approval, with the approval-cutoff, or
by only ranking your strong top-set.
So, though Compromise could become pair-beaten by Favorite because you
raise Favorite to top with Compromise, resulting in a cycle instead of a
CWv win for Favorite, the cycle will be judged by approvals, and you're
approved only your strong top-set.
Of course, just because Favorite was almost the CWv doesn't necessarily
mean that s/he'll win the Approval count. But are you any worse off than
you'd have been with MDDA?
Forest (but maybe others too) has proposed a number of methods that
combine pairwise-count and Approval. Do any of those beat MDDA &
Smith//Approval by the standards of protecting one's strong top-set, and
Middle1 & Middle2?
in particular, do any of them do better than MDDA by those standards? Do
any do as well as MDDA by those standards and have as brief a defintion, or
nearly as brief a definition?
In other words, are there methods that achieve those things better than
MDDA & Smith//Approval, or achieve them better than MDDA and have as brief
a definition?
In fact, is there a method that meets FBC (or doesn't need it), meets CD,
and does as well by Middle1 & Middle2 as MDDA, Smith//Approval or Bucklin?
Michael Ossipoff
But wouldn't Smith//Approval, with approval cutoffs in the rankings, share
MDDTR's burial-vullnerability?
...with, additionally, vulnerability to truncation, which MDDTR _doesn't_
have?
And Smith//Approval trades MDDTR's FBC for Smith, which I consider an
unfavorable trade.
I now again consider Benham & Woodall to be the best proposals for an
electorate that wants &/or needs rankings...because of the IRV mitigations
that i mentioned in my previous posting, and because of the context of the
always high price of CD, as exemplified by MDDTR.
It could be debatable whether IRV's CWs elimination problem is worse than
MDDTR's burial vulnerability problem, but, because of IRV's mitigations, I
tend to feel that IRV is better, _for people who want or need routine
ranking_.
Myself, I personally prefer MDDTR, with middle-ranking usually avoided, but
I'm talking about what's best for the electorate as a whole.
In polls with balloting by both Approval & Score, I've observed
overcompromisers doing better with Score than with Approval. They (and
rival parties) would probably do even better with rankings.
Suggested merit-order for electorates that want &/or need rankings:
1.Benham
2. woodall
3. IRV
4. MDDTR
5. Methods combining Approval with pairwise-count
6. ER Bucklin/MJ
7. Score
8. Approval
I still personally prefer Approval, or maybe MDDTR, when used as Approval
with 2nd-ranking as a defection-deterrent. But this suggested merit-order
is for electorates who want &/or need rankings.
On pure merit, Woodall seems a bit better than Benham, because it's more
particular which Smith-set member it elects. But Benham is much briefer to
define, not needing to define or mention the Smith-set, and that makes a
big difference in proposability, which outweighs the small merit-difference.
I don't know the merit-order among the methods that combine Approval with
pairwise-count.
Maybe the ones that start with Approval are better than the ones that start
with pairwise-count.
Among those, Brams' PAV is vulnerable to truncation, where MAMPO isn't.
But maybe that's a good thing, if the majority CWs among the
majority-approved candidates isn't in your strong top-set.
A proposal that the Greens upgrade from IRV to Benham seems reasonably
proposable.
Though Benham & Woodall are vulnerable to burial & truncation, the worst
that can result from those strategies is the same as what IRV would have
done anyway.
Michael Ossipoff
On Thu, Nov 17, 2016 at 9:05 AM, C.Benham <cbenham@adam.com.au> wrote:
> On 11/17/2016 9:00 AM, Forest Simmons wrote:
>
> Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without having
> to mention the Smith set:
>
> List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
> bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate higher in
> the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order adjacent members.
>
> When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate at
> the top of the list.
>
>
> Forest,
>
> I like Smith//Approval and your usually equivalent Max Covered Approval
> method.
>
> But in this version, the stipulation that we "switch places of the two
> *lowest* out of order adjacent members" could look a bit arbitrary and
> less smooth
> than Margins-Sorted Approval.
>
> BTW, it seems to me that both this and Smith//Approval can handle the
> Chicken Dilemma situation quite well if we use ranked ballots with
> approval cut-offs.
>
> (Or ratings ballots with many slots that register approval and as many
> (or maybe as few as only 2) that register unapproval.)
>
> http://wiki.electorama.com/wiki/Approval_Sorted_Margins
>
> http://wiki.electorama.com/wiki/Approval_Cutoff
>
> And here's another smooth Condorcet method that should do as well:
>
> *Voters score the candidates on some scale that allows large and varied
> gaps between the candidates: say 0-100.
> Elect the CW if there is one.
>
> Otherwise compress the 1-point gaps (if any) on all ballots into
> zero-point gaps (so that those ballots abandon their original pairwise
> preference for any
> X originally scored only one point more than any Y).
>
> Based on the thus modified ballot information, elect the CW if there is
> one.
>
> Otherwise compress the 2-point gaps (if any) on all ballots into
> zero-point gaps (so that those ballots abandon their original pairwise
> preference for any
> X originally scored two points more than any Y).
>
> Based on the thus modified ballot information, elect the CW if there is
> one.
>
> And so on, as gradually as possible compressing larger and larger gaps
> until we have a pairwise beats-all winner.*
>
> Chris Benham
>
>
>
> On 11/17/2016 9:00 AM, Forest Simmons wrote:
>
> Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without having
> to mention the Smith set:
>
> List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
> bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate higher in
> the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order adjacent members.
>
> When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate at
> the top of the list.
>
> Note that the winner will automatically be a member of the top cycle, and
> if it is a cycle of three, it will be the most approved member of the cycle.
>
> Also notice that it yields an unambiguous social order, and that there can
> be no second place complaint.
>
>
>
>
>
> On Tue, Nov 15, 2016 at 5:19 PM, Michael Ossipoff <email9648742@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> When I started my current EM participation, I was saying that 3-Slot ICT
>> was my favorite method.
>>
>> That doesn't conflict with saying that I consider Approval the best,
>> because I regard 3-Slot ICT, or unlimited-rankings ICT (when used
>> approval-like) as an Approval version without chicken-dilemma.
>>
>> Later I realized that MDDTR is better than ICT, because it gives better
>> protection to middle candidates.
>>
>> I measure that protection by how well they'd be protected if they were
>> CWs. ...what it would take to protect their win, and how well it's
>> protected.
>>
>> I define "middle candidates" as candidates you rank or rate below top and
>> above bottom.
>>
>> ICT gives no protection to middle candidates, against burial, or even
>> against innocent, non-strategic truncation--the two things that threaten a
>> CWs in pairwise-c0unt methods.
>>
>> MDDTR gives full truncation-proofness to middle candidates, but (contrary
>> to what I earlier believed), its protection of middle candidates against
>> burial can only be called "shabby".
>>
>> By the way, I no longer think that ICT or MDDTR needs to be 3-slot.
>> 3-Slot would be fine with me, because I believe that ICT or MDDTR should be
>> used as Approval, and that middle rating or ranking should only be used
>> when seriously needed to deter chicken-dilemma defection. When middle is
>> used in an unlimited-ranking MDDTR or ICT, it should probably consist of
>> 2nd-place ranking, if you want to give the demoted candidates the best
>> protection. ...but maybe you'd rather rank them with respect to
>> eachother, at different middle levels, as I probably sometimes would.
>>
>> But, as I've been saying, activists & organizations seem to like
>> rankings, and some people--overcompromisers & rival parties--might very
>> well need rankings to soften their voting errors.
>>
>> And it seems to me that there's no particular reason not to rank, in
>> order of preference, your middle candidates, if some of them are better
>> than others, or if the voters of some of them are less trustworthy than
>> others.
>>
>> So, that's if you want CD, in addition to FBC, and good protection for
>> middle candidates
>>
>> Even if you're using the method as Approval, you still want your demoted
>> candidate(s) to be well protected. Just because you don't trust hir voters
>> doesn't mean you want to throw her to the hounds and thereby lower Pt, the
>> probability of electing from your strong top-set.
>>
>> Anyway, so far, this is all referring to CD methods.
>>
>> Of those, I like MDDTR best. As a rank method, it (as i said) gives only
>> shabby burial-protection to a middle candidate. But evidently (please tell
>> me it isn't so) you can't have FBC, CD, and good protection of middle
>> candidates.
>>
>> I consider CD more important to how well protected middle candidates are.
>> Yes, FBC + CD give poor protection to middle candidates, and that lessens
>> the value of their CD. But non-CD methods don't have CD at all, and that's
>> worse.
>>
>> So I prefer MDDTR to methods that give better protection to middle
>> candidates, but don't have CD.
>>
>> So, where I used to say that my favorite method is 3-Slot ICT, now I say
>> that my favorite method is MDDTR. Preferably with unlimited rankings.
>> (Though one could use only the 1st, 2nd, & bottom positions if one chose
>> to). ...regardable as a chicken-dilemma-free version of Approval.
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> Non-CD methods with better "middle-strategy" than CD methods:
>>
>> But, in an election, I'm just one voter, and so, how well-suited the
>> method is to me is less important, and won't affect the outcome as much, in
>> comparison to how well-suited the method is to lots of progressives.
>>
>> So, what if most progressives would rather have a method that's really
>> good as a rank method, a method that has good "middle strategy" (strategy
>> for protecting a middle candidate's win if s/he's CWs).
>>
>> That would be important if you knew that all or nearly all, or even most
>> of them were going to use the method purely as a rank method.
>>
>> Bucklin is the traditional FBC rankings-method.
>>
>> I distinguish 2 kinds of middle strategy merit:
>>
>> 1. How well the method protects top-ranked candidates against
>> middle-ranked candidates. I call that "Middle1"
>>
>> 2. How well the lmethod protects a middle-ranked candidate against any
>> candidate you rank lower than hir. I call that "Middle2".
>>
>> So, how to get the best middle strategy, with the main goal still being
>> keeping a good probability, Pt, of electing from your strong top-set?
>>
>> MDDTR's middle1 seems better than that of Bucklin. In MDDTR, you're
>> voting to contribute to a majority for your top against your middle. In
>> Bucklin, you can protect top against middle by skipping some rating-levels
>> above the middle candidates. In that way, you can give the top candidates
>> time to receive the coalescing lower-choice votes that they'll get from the
>> preferrers of other candidates, before giving anything to the middle
>> candidates.
>>
>> That's a bit more work than just ranking in order of preference. It
>> requires you to judge where, and how far down in rankings, your top
>> candidates are going to receive lower-choice votes from.
>>
>> So I suggest that MDDTR does better at Middle1 than Bucklin does.
>>
>> But Bucklin does better at Middle2.
>>
>> In Bucklin, the CWs's win is protected by the people who pretty-much
>> agree with you, the people of your wing, merely not ranking down too far.
>>
>> MDDTR needs that too, but it isn't enough to give MDDTR more than shabby
>> protection.
>>
>> ...And Bucklin's Middle1, though not as convenient or easy as that of
>> MDDTR, isn't as questionable as MDDTR's Middle2.
>>
>> So, overall, I'd say that Bucklin's Middle Strategy is better than that
>> of MDDTR. So, for people who want to use the method purely as a
>> rank-method, Bucklin is better than MDDTR.
>>
>> Bucklin also has the advantage of use-precedent. MDDT has the advantage
>> of precinct-summability,but I don't consider that essential.
>>
>> For voters using the method purely as a rank method, I'd prefer Bucklin
>> to MDDTR.
>>
>> Chicken dilemma won't happen all the time, probably won't happen often.
>> But middle-protection will always matter to people using it as a rank
>> method.
>>
>> But it seems to me that, once we give up CD (for voters who need good
>> middle strategly, because of their rank voting), then it might be possible
>> to do better than Bucklin.
>>
>> It seems to me that methods that use both Approval and pairwise-count can
>> do better than Bucklin, at middle protection.
>>
>> A lot of methods of that kind have been proposed, and I've ignored all of
>> them because they don't meet CD. But, as mentioned above, for some
>> electorates, middle strategy could be more important.
>>
>> It seems to me that MDDA (also evidently named MPOA) and Smith//Approval
>> are two methods that might be better than Bucklin at middle protection..
>>
>> Using Approval as the cycle-solution is a very powerful idea (if you're
>> willing to give up CD, for an electorate's needs). But most of you already
>> knew that, before I paid attention to it (...because I was only looking at
>> CD methods)..
>>
>> MDDA's & Smith//Approval's burial vulnerability doesn't matter much, when
>> the Approval winner wins the cycle. In fact, Smith//Approval's
>> truncation-vulnerability could even be regarded as an advantage, for when
>> your strong top-set doesn't include the CWs.
>>
>> MDDA & Smith//Approval look better to me than Bucklin.
>>
>> Simpler Middle1.
>>
>> Precinct-Summability is an added bonus.
>>
>> MDDA seems to have a briefer definition than either Bucklin or
>> Smith//Approval, and brief definition can be decisive.
>>
>> I know of Bucklin being rejected when MDDTR was accepted. MDDA would
>> almost surely have been accepted too.
>>
>> I don't think Smith//Approval would go over well, with its need to
>> define the Smith set, which greatly lengthens the definition.
>>
>> For an electorate that need good Middle1 & Middle2 more than CD, MDDA
>> seems the winner so far.
>>
>> Smith//Approvsl of course meets Smith. ...which of course means that it
>> fails FBC. But does it need FBC?
>>
>> It could be argued (but I don't know if it's true) that Smith//Approval
>> doesn't need FBC, because, though you don't have an efffective Approval
>> vote at the top, you still can vote Approval, with the approval-cutoff, or
>> by only ranking your strong top-set.
>>
>> So, though Compromise could become pair-beaten by Favorite because you
>> raise Favorite to top with Compromise, resulting in a cycle instead of a
>> CWv win for Favorite, the cycle will be judged by approvals, and you're
>> approved only your strong top-set.
>>
>> Of course, just because Favorite was almost the CWv doesn't necessarily
>> mean that s/he'll win the Approval count. But are you any worse off than
>> you'd have been with MDDA?
>>
>> Forest (but maybe others too) has proposed a number of methods that
>> combine pairwise-count and Approval. Do any of those beat MDDA &
>> Smith//Approval by the standards of protecting one's strong top-set, and
>> Middle1 & Middle2?
>>
>> in particular, do any of them do better than MDDA by those standards? Do
>> any do as well as MDDA by those standards and have as brief a defintion, or
>> nearly as brief a definition?
>>
>> In other words, are there methods that achieve those things better than
>> MDDA & Smith//Approval, or achieve them better than MDDA and have as brief
>> a definition?
>>
>> In fact, is there a method that meets FBC (or doesn't need it), meets CD,
>> and does as well by Middle1 & Middle2 as MDDA, Smith//Approval or Bucklin?
>>
>> Michael Ossipoff
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
>
FS
Forest Simmons
Thu, Nov 17, 2016 7:09 PM
Yes, it is different. Standard Pairwise Sorted Approval starts sorting from
the top and works down. This version starts at the bottom and works up.
Here's a simple recursive definition:
Elect the most approved candidate that is not beaten pairwise by the second
place candidate.
[The second place candidate is the one that would be elected by the method
if the first place candidate withdrew.]
Because of this characterization of the method we could call it MAI for
"Most Approved Immune." Here "immune" refers to immunity from second place
complaints.
So the shortest (and most cryptic) definition of the method is
Elect the Most Approved Immune candidate X.
To unpack this definition you have to define immunity as meaning unbeaten
by the runnerup, and define runnerup as the (recursive) winner of the
ballot set with X disqualified.
On Wed, Nov 16, 2016 at 2:55 PM, Monkey Puzzle <araucaria.araucana@gmail.com
Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without having
to mention the Smith set:
List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate higher in
the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order adjacent members.
When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate at
the top of the list.
Note that the winner will automatically be a member of the top cycle, and
if it is a cycle of three, it will be the most approved member of the cycle.
Also notice that it yields an unambiguous social order, and that there
can be no second place complaint.
On Tue, Nov 15, 2016 at 5:19 PM, Michael Ossipoff <email9648742@gmail.com
When I started my current EM participation, I was saying that 3-Slot ICT
was my favorite method.
That doesn't conflict with saying that I consider Approval the best,
because I regard 3-Slot ICT, or unlimited-rankings ICT (when used
approval-like) as an Approval version without chicken-dilemma.
Later I realized that MDDTR is better than ICT, because it gives better
protection to middle candidates.
I measure that protection by how well they'd be protected if they were
CWs. ...what it would take to protect their win, and how well it's
protected.
I define "middle candidates" as candidates you rank or rate below top
and above bottom.
ICT gives no protection to middle candidates, against burial, or even
against innocent, non-strategic truncation--the two things that threaten a
CWs in pairwise-c0unt methods.
MDDTR gives full truncation-proofness to middle candidates, but
(contrary to what I earlier believed), its protection of middle candidates
against burial can only be called "shabby".
By the way, I no longer think that ICT or MDDTR needs to be 3-slot.
3-Slot would be fine with me, because I believe that ICT or MDDTR should be
used as Approval, and that middle rating or ranking should only be used
when seriously needed to deter chicken-dilemma defection. When middle is
used in an unlimited-ranking MDDTR or ICT, it should probably consist of
2nd-place ranking, if you want to give the demoted candidates the best
protection. ...but maybe you'd rather rank them with respect to
eachother, at different middle levels, as I probably sometimes would.
But, as I've been saying, activists & organizations seem to like
rankings, and some people--overcompromisers & rival parties--might very
well need rankings to soften their voting errors.
And it seems to me that there's no particular reason not to rank, in
order of preference, your middle candidates, if some of them are better
than others, or if the voters of some of them are less trustworthy than
others.
So, that's if you want CD, in addition to FBC, and good protection for
middle candidates
Even if you're using the method as Approval, you still want your demoted
candidate(s) to be well protected. Just because you don't trust hir voters
doesn't mean you want to throw her to the hounds and thereby lower Pt, the
probability of electing from your strong top-set.
Anyway, so far, this is all referring to CD methods.
Of those, I like MDDTR best. As a rank method, it (as i said) gives only
shabby burial-protection to a middle candidate. But evidently (please tell
me it isn't so) you can't have FBC, CD, and good protection of middle
candidates.
I consider CD more important to how well protected middle candidates
are. Yes, FBC + CD give poor protection to middle candidates, and that
lessens the value of their CD. But non-CD methods don't have CD at all, and
that's worse.
So I prefer MDDTR to methods that give better protection to middle
candidates, but don't have CD.
So, where I used to say that my favorite method is 3-Slot ICT, now I say
that my favorite method is MDDTR. Preferably with unlimited rankings.
(Though one could use only the 1st, 2nd, & bottom positions if one chose
to). ...regardable as a chicken-dilemma-free version of Approval.
Non-CD methods with better "middle-strategy" than CD methods:
But, in an election, I'm just one voter, and so, how well-suited the
method is to me is less important, and won't affect the outcome as much, in
comparison to how well-suited the method is to lots of progressives.
So, what if most progressives would rather have a method that's really
good as a rank method, a method that has good "middle strategy" (strategy
for protecting a middle candidate's win if s/he's CWs).
That would be important if you knew that all or nearly all, or even most
of them were going to use the method purely as a rank method.
Bucklin is the traditional FBC rankings-method.
I distinguish 2 kinds of middle strategy merit:
-
How well the method protects top-ranked candidates against
middle-ranked candidates. I call that "Middle1"
-
How well the lmethod protects a middle-ranked candidate against any
candidate you rank lower than hir. I call that "Middle2".
So, how to get the best middle strategy, with the main goal still being
keeping a good probability, Pt, of electing from your strong top-set?
MDDTR's middle1 seems better than that of Bucklin. In MDDTR, you're
voting to contribute to a majority for your top against your middle. In
Bucklin, you can protect top against middle by skipping some rating-levels
above the middle candidates. In that way, you can give the top candidates
time to receive the coalescing lower-choice votes that they'll get from the
preferrers of other candidates, before giving anything to the middle
candidates.
That's a bit more work than just ranking in order of preference. It
requires you to judge where, and how far down in rankings, your top
candidates are going to receive lower-choice votes from.
So I suggest that MDDTR does better at Middle1 than Bucklin does.
But Bucklin does better at Middle2.
In Bucklin, the CWs's win is protected by the people who pretty-much
agree with you, the people of your wing, merely not ranking down too far.
MDDTR needs that too, but it isn't enough to give MDDTR more than shabby
protection.
...And Bucklin's Middle1, though not as convenient or easy as that of
MDDTR, isn't as questionable as MDDTR's Middle2.
So, overall, I'd say that Bucklin's Middle Strategy is better than that
of MDDTR. So, for people who want to use the method purely as a
rank-method, Bucklin is better than MDDTR.
Bucklin also has the advantage of use-precedent. MDDT has the advantage
of precinct-summability,but I don't consider that essential.
For voters using the method purely as a rank method, I'd prefer Bucklin
to MDDTR.
Chicken dilemma won't happen all the time, probably won't happen often.
But middle-protection will always matter to people using it as a rank
method.
But it seems to me that, once we give up CD (for voters who need good
middle strategly, because of their rank voting), then it might be possible
to do better than Bucklin.
It seems to me that methods that use both Approval and pairwise-count
can do better than Bucklin, at middle protection.
A lot of methods of that kind have been proposed, and I've ignored all
of them because they don't meet CD. But, as mentioned above, for some
electorates, middle strategy could be more important.
It seems to me that MDDA (also evidently named MPOA) and Smith//Approval
are two methods that might be better than Bucklin at middle protection..
Using Approval as the cycle-solution is a very powerful idea (if you're
willing to give up CD, for an electorate's needs). But most of you already
knew that, before I paid attention to it (...because I was only looking at
CD methods)..
MDDA's & Smith//Approval's burial vulnerability doesn't matter much,
when the Approval winner wins the cycle. In fact, Smith//Approval's
truncation-vulnerability could even be regarded as an advantage, for when
your strong top-set doesn't include the CWs.
MDDA & Smith//Approval look better to me than Bucklin.
Simpler Middle1.
Precinct-Summability is an added bonus.
MDDA seems to have a briefer definition than either Bucklin or
Smith//Approval, and brief definition can be decisive.
I know of Bucklin being rejected when MDDTR was accepted. MDDA would
almost surely have been accepted too.
I don't think Smith//Approval would go over well, with its need to
define the Smith set, which greatly lengthens the definition.
For an electorate that need good Middle1 & Middle2 more than CD, MDDA
seems the winner so far.
Smith//Approvsl of course meets Smith. ...which of course means that it
fails FBC. But does it need FBC?
It could be argued (but I don't know if it's true) that Smith//Approval
doesn't need FBC, because, though you don't have an efffective Approval
vote at the top, you still can vote Approval, with the approval-cutoff, or
by only ranking your strong top-set.
So, though Compromise could become pair-beaten by Favorite because you
raise Favorite to top with Compromise, resulting in a cycle instead of a
CWv win for Favorite, the cycle will be judged by approvals, and you're
approved only your strong top-set.
Of course, just because Favorite was almost the CWv doesn't necessarily
mean that s/he'll win the Approval count. But are you any worse off than
you'd have been with MDDA?
Forest (but maybe others too) has proposed a number of methods that
combine pairwise-count and Approval. Do any of those beat MDDA &
Smith//Approval by the standards of protecting one's strong top-set, and
Middle1 & Middle2?
in particular, do any of them do better than MDDA by those standards? Do
any do as well as MDDA by those standards and have as brief a defintion, or
nearly as brief a definition?
In other words, are there methods that achieve those things better than
MDDA & Smith//Approval, or achieve them better than MDDA and have as brief
a definition?
In fact, is there a method that meets FBC (or doesn't need it), meets
CD, and does as well by Middle1 & Middle2 as MDDA, Smith//Approval or
Bucklin?
Michael Ossipoff
Yes, it is different. Standard Pairwise Sorted Approval starts sorting from
the top and works down. This version starts at the bottom and works up.
Here's a simple recursive definition:
Elect the most approved candidate that is not beaten pairwise by the second
place candidate.
[The second place candidate is the one that would be elected by the method
if the first place candidate withdrew.]
Because of this characterization of the method we could call it MAI for
"Most Approved Immune." Here "immune" refers to immunity from second place
complaints.
So the shortest (and most cryptic) definition of the method is
Elect the Most Approved Immune candidate X.
To unpack this definition you have to define immunity as meaning unbeaten
by the runnerup, and define runnerup as the (recursive) winner of the
ballot set with X disqualified.
On Wed, Nov 16, 2016 at 2:55 PM, Monkey Puzzle <araucaria.araucana@gmail.com
> wrote:
> Hi Forest,
>
> Is your suggestion different from Pairwise Sorted Approval?
>
> http://wiki.electorama.com/wiki/Pairwise_Sorted_Approval
>
> If not, the winner is not necessarily the most approved candidate in the
> Smith set.
>
>
> Frango ut patefaciam -- I break so that I may reveal
>
> On Wed, Nov 16, 2016 at 2:30 PM, Forest Simmons <fsimmons@pcc.edu> wrote:
>
>> Here's a simple method that is essentially Smith//Approval without having
>> to mention the Smith set:
>>
>> List the candidates in order of approval, highest to lowest, top to
>> bottom. While any candidate pairwise beats an adjacent candidate higher in
>> the list, switch places of the two lowest out of order adjacent members.
>>
>> When there remains no out of order adjacent pair, elect the candidate at
>> the top of the list.
>>
>> Note that the winner will automatically be a member of the top cycle, and
>> if it is a cycle of three, it will be the most approved member of the cycle.
>>
>> Also notice that it yields an unambiguous social order, and that there
>> can be no second place complaint.
>>
>> On Tue, Nov 15, 2016 at 5:19 PM, Michael Ossipoff <email9648742@gmail.com
>> > wrote:
>>
>>> When I started my current EM participation, I was saying that 3-Slot ICT
>>> was my favorite method.
>>>
>>> That doesn't conflict with saying that I consider Approval the best,
>>> because I regard 3-Slot ICT, or unlimited-rankings ICT (when used
>>> approval-like) as an Approval version without chicken-dilemma.
>>>
>>> Later I realized that MDDTR is better than ICT, because it gives better
>>> protection to middle candidates.
>>>
>>> I measure that protection by how well they'd be protected if they were
>>> CWs. ...what it would take to protect their win, and how well it's
>>> protected.
>>>
>>> I define "middle candidates" as candidates you rank or rate below top
>>> and above bottom.
>>>
>>> ICT gives no protection to middle candidates, against burial, or even
>>> against innocent, non-strategic truncation--the two things that threaten a
>>> CWs in pairwise-c0unt methods.
>>>
>>> MDDTR gives full truncation-proofness to middle candidates, but
>>> (contrary to what I earlier believed), its protection of middle candidates
>>> against burial can only be called "shabby".
>>>
>>> By the way, I no longer think that ICT or MDDTR needs to be 3-slot.
>>> 3-Slot would be fine with me, because I believe that ICT or MDDTR should be
>>> used as Approval, and that middle rating or ranking should only be used
>>> when seriously needed to deter chicken-dilemma defection. When middle is
>>> used in an unlimited-ranking MDDTR or ICT, it should probably consist of
>>> 2nd-place ranking, if you want to give the demoted candidates the best
>>> protection. ...but maybe you'd rather rank them with respect to
>>> eachother, at different middle levels, as I probably sometimes would.
>>>
>>> But, as I've been saying, activists & organizations seem to like
>>> rankings, and some people--overcompromisers & rival parties--might very
>>> well need rankings to soften their voting errors.
>>>
>>> And it seems to me that there's no particular reason not to rank, in
>>> order of preference, your middle candidates, if some of them are better
>>> than others, or if the voters of some of them are less trustworthy than
>>> others.
>>>
>>> So, that's if you want CD, in addition to FBC, and good protection for
>>> middle candidates
>>>
>>> Even if you're using the method as Approval, you still want your demoted
>>> candidate(s) to be well protected. Just because you don't trust hir voters
>>> doesn't mean you want to throw her to the hounds and thereby lower Pt, the
>>> probability of electing from your strong top-set.
>>>
>>> Anyway, so far, this is all referring to CD methods.
>>>
>>> Of those, I like MDDTR best. As a rank method, it (as i said) gives only
>>> shabby burial-protection to a middle candidate. But evidently (please tell
>>> me it isn't so) you can't have FBC, CD, and good protection of middle
>>> candidates.
>>>
>>> I consider CD more important to how well protected middle candidates
>>> are. Yes, FBC + CD give poor protection to middle candidates, and that
>>> lessens the value of their CD. But non-CD methods don't have CD at all, and
>>> that's worse.
>>>
>>> So I prefer MDDTR to methods that give better protection to middle
>>> candidates, but don't have CD.
>>>
>>> So, where I used to say that my favorite method is 3-Slot ICT, now I say
>>> that my favorite method is MDDTR. Preferably with unlimited rankings.
>>> (Though one could use only the 1st, 2nd, & bottom positions if one chose
>>> to). ...regardable as a chicken-dilemma-free version of Approval.
>>>
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>
>>> Non-CD methods with better "middle-strategy" than CD methods:
>>>
>>> But, in an election, I'm just one voter, and so, how well-suited the
>>> method is to me is less important, and won't affect the outcome as much, in
>>> comparison to how well-suited the method is to lots of progressives.
>>>
>>> So, what if most progressives would rather have a method that's really
>>> good as a rank method, a method that has good "middle strategy" (strategy
>>> for protecting a middle candidate's win if s/he's CWs).
>>>
>>> That would be important if you knew that all or nearly all, or even most
>>> of them were going to use the method purely as a rank method.
>>>
>>> Bucklin is the traditional FBC rankings-method.
>>>
>>> I distinguish 2 kinds of middle strategy merit:
>>>
>>> 1. How well the method protects top-ranked candidates against
>>> middle-ranked candidates. I call that "Middle1"
>>>
>>> 2. How well the lmethod protects a middle-ranked candidate against any
>>> candidate you rank lower than hir. I call that "Middle2".
>>>
>>> So, how to get the best middle strategy, with the main goal still being
>>> keeping a good probability, Pt, of electing from your strong top-set?
>>>
>>> MDDTR's middle1 seems better than that of Bucklin. In MDDTR, you're
>>> voting to contribute to a majority for your top against your middle. In
>>> Bucklin, you can protect top against middle by skipping some rating-levels
>>> above the middle candidates. In that way, you can give the top candidates
>>> time to receive the coalescing lower-choice votes that they'll get from the
>>> preferrers of other candidates, before giving anything to the middle
>>> candidates.
>>>
>>> That's a bit more work than just ranking in order of preference. It
>>> requires you to judge where, and how far down in rankings, your top
>>> candidates are going to receive lower-choice votes from.
>>>
>>> So I suggest that MDDTR does better at Middle1 than Bucklin does.
>>>
>>> But Bucklin does better at Middle2.
>>>
>>> In Bucklin, the CWs's win is protected by the people who pretty-much
>>> agree with you, the people of your wing, merely not ranking down too far.
>>>
>>> MDDTR needs that too, but it isn't enough to give MDDTR more than shabby
>>> protection.
>>>
>>> ...And Bucklin's Middle1, though not as convenient or easy as that of
>>> MDDTR, isn't as questionable as MDDTR's Middle2.
>>>
>>> So, overall, I'd say that Bucklin's Middle Strategy is better than that
>>> of MDDTR. So, for people who want to use the method purely as a
>>> rank-method, Bucklin is better than MDDTR.
>>>
>>> Bucklin also has the advantage of use-precedent. MDDT has the advantage
>>> of precinct-summability,but I don't consider that essential.
>>>
>>> For voters using the method purely as a rank method, I'd prefer Bucklin
>>> to MDDTR.
>>>
>>> Chicken dilemma won't happen all the time, probably won't happen often.
>>> But middle-protection will always matter to people using it as a rank
>>> method.
>>>
>>> But it seems to me that, once we give up CD (for voters who need good
>>> middle strategly, because of their rank voting), then it might be possible
>>> to do better than Bucklin.
>>>
>>> It seems to me that methods that use both Approval and pairwise-count
>>> can do better than Bucklin, at middle protection.
>>>
>>> A lot of methods of that kind have been proposed, and I've ignored all
>>> of them because they don't meet CD. But, as mentioned above, for some
>>> electorates, middle strategy could be more important.
>>>
>>> It seems to me that MDDA (also evidently named MPOA) and Smith//Approval
>>> are two methods that might be better than Bucklin at middle protection..
>>>
>>> Using Approval as the cycle-solution is a very powerful idea (if you're
>>> willing to give up CD, for an electorate's needs). But most of you already
>>> knew that, before I paid attention to it (...because I was only looking at
>>> CD methods)..
>>>
>>> MDDA's & Smith//Approval's burial vulnerability doesn't matter much,
>>> when the Approval winner wins the cycle. In fact, Smith//Approval's
>>> truncation-vulnerability could even be regarded as an advantage, for when
>>> your strong top-set doesn't include the CWs.
>>>
>>> MDDA & Smith//Approval look better to me than Bucklin.
>>>
>>> Simpler Middle1.
>>>
>>> Precinct-Summability is an added bonus.
>>>
>>> MDDA seems to have a briefer definition than either Bucklin or
>>> Smith//Approval, and brief definition can be decisive.
>>>
>>> I know of Bucklin being rejected when MDDTR was accepted. MDDA would
>>> almost surely have been accepted too.
>>>
>>> I don't think Smith//Approval would go over well, with its need to
>>> define the Smith set, which greatly lengthens the definition.
>>>
>>> For an electorate that need good Middle1 & Middle2 more than CD, MDDA
>>> seems the winner so far.
>>>
>>> Smith//Approvsl of course meets Smith. ...which of course means that it
>>> fails FBC. But does it need FBC?
>>>
>>> It could be argued (but I don't know if it's true) that Smith//Approval
>>> doesn't need FBC, because, though you don't have an efffective Approval
>>> vote at the top, you still can vote Approval, with the approval-cutoff, or
>>> by only ranking your strong top-set.
>>>
>>> So, though Compromise could become pair-beaten by Favorite because you
>>> raise Favorite to top with Compromise, resulting in a cycle instead of a
>>> CWv win for Favorite, the cycle will be judged by approvals, and you're
>>> approved only your strong top-set.
>>>
>>> Of course, just because Favorite was almost the CWv doesn't necessarily
>>> mean that s/he'll win the Approval count. But are you any worse off than
>>> you'd have been with MDDA?
>>>
>>> Forest (but maybe others too) has proposed a number of methods that
>>> combine pairwise-count and Approval. Do any of those beat MDDA &
>>> Smith//Approval by the standards of protecting one's strong top-set, and
>>> Middle1 & Middle2?
>>>
>>> in particular, do any of them do better than MDDA by those standards? Do
>>> any do as well as MDDA by those standards and have as brief a defintion, or
>>> nearly as brief a definition?
>>>
>>> In other words, are there methods that achieve those things better than
>>> MDDA & Smith//Approval, or achieve them better than MDDA and have as brief
>>> a definition?
>>>
>>> In fact, is there a method that meets FBC (or doesn't need it), meets
>>> CD, and does as well by Middle1 & Middle2 as MDDA, Smith//Approval or
>>> Bucklin?
>>>
>>> Michael Ossipoff
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>> ----
>> Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list
>> info
>>
>>
>
FS
Forest Simmons
Thu, Nov 17, 2016 7:55 PM
But wouldn't Smith//Approval, with approval cutoffs in the rankings, share
MDDTR's burial-vullnerability?
...with, additionally, vulnerability to truncation, which MDDTR doesn't
have?
And Smith//Approval trades MDDTR's FBC for Smith, which I consider an
unfavorable trade.
Perhaps make truncation the default approval cutoff, but let voters move it
higher as an option:
45 C
30 A>B or A>>B
25 B
Voting A>>B would be the chicken defense (where sincere is 25 B>A).
Voting A>B would be the truncation defense (where sincere is 45 C>B).
With this option, MDDA would be an FBC compliant method that is truncation
and burial resistant as well as quasi CD compliant.
Is there a way to modify MDDA to make it satisfy mono-add-plump?
How about incorporating some form of power truncation. When you plump X
and reduce the majority victory of Y over Z to a sub-majority, it would
revert to a majority if you counted the common truncation of Y and Z
against each other as even half a point.
Btw, in case you didn't see it, one of my new favorite non-FBC methods is
Most Approved Immune(MAI): Elect the most approved immune candidate.
This means elect the most approved candidate X that is unbeaten pairwise by
the candidate that would win (recursively) if the method were applied to
the same ballot set with X disqualified or withdrawn.
It is the simplest approval based rank method that confers immunity from
second place complaints on its winners.
It is quasi CD compliant if voters can specify their approval cutoffs above
the truncation level when they want to.
A top rank version of this method is fully CD compliant:
Elect the Most Top Ranked Immune candidate. (MTRI)
In other words elect the most top ranked candidate X that is unbeaten
pairwise by the candidate that would win (recursively) if the method were
applied to the same ballot set with X disqualified or withdrawn.
Forest
On Thu, Nov 17, 2016 at 10:54 AM, Michael Ossipoff <email9648742@gmail.com>
wrote:
> But wouldn't Smith//Approval, with approval cutoffs in the rankings, share
> MDDTR's burial-vullnerability?
>
> ...with, additionally, vulnerability to truncation, which MDDTR _doesn't_
> have?
>
> And Smith//Approval trades MDDTR's FBC for Smith, which I consider an
> unfavorable trade.
>
Perhaps make truncation the default approval cutoff, but let voters move it
higher as an option:
45 C
30 A>B or A>>B
25 B
Voting A>>B would be the chicken defense (where sincere is 25 B>A).
Voting A>B would be the truncation defense (where sincere is 45 C>B).
With this option, MDDA would be an FBC compliant method that is truncation
and burial resistant as well as quasi CD compliant.
Is there a way to modify MDDA to make it satisfy mono-add-plump?
How about incorporating some form of power truncation. When you plump X
and reduce the majority victory of Y over Z to a sub-majority, it would
revert to a majority if you counted the common truncation of Y and Z
against each other as even half a point.
Btw, in case you didn't see it, one of my new favorite non-FBC methods is
Most Approved Immune(MAI): Elect the most approved immune candidate.
This means elect the most approved candidate X that is unbeaten pairwise by
the candidate that would win (recursively) if the method were applied to
the same ballot set with X disqualified or withdrawn.
It is the simplest approval based rank method that confers immunity from
second place complaints on its winners.
It is quasi CD compliant if voters can specify their approval cutoffs above
the truncation level when they want to.
A top rank version of this method is fully CD compliant:
Elect the Most Top Ranked Immune candidate. (MTRI)
In other words elect the most top ranked candidate X that is unbeaten
pairwise by the candidate that would win (recursively) if the method were
applied to the same ballot set with X disqualified or withdrawn.
Forest
MO
Michael Ossipoff
Thu, Nov 17, 2016 10:05 PM
For this method, MTRI, the procedural definition is more understandable
than the recursive definition (though the recursive definition's brevity
could be useful).
So this is what I understand MTRI's procedural definition to be:
-
Order the candidates by their top-count score, with higher scores at top.
-
Switch the lowest pair of adjacent candidates whose lower candidate
pair-beats the higher one.
Repeat till there are no more pairs to switch. The highest candidate in the
order at that time wins.
As a CD rank method, this method is a competitor of MDDTR. What are the
property differences between MTRI & MDDTR?
In particular, how does MTRI compare with MDDTR in regards to protection of
a CWs against truncation & burial?
Michael Ossipoff
On Thu, Nov 17, 2016 at 2:55 PM, Forest Simmons fsimmons@pcc.edu wrote:
But wouldn't Smith//Approval, with approval cutoffs in the rankings,
share MDDTR's burial-vullnerability?
...with, additionally, vulnerability to truncation, which MDDTR doesn't
have?
And Smith//Approval trades MDDTR's FBC for Smith, which I consider an
unfavorable trade.
Perhaps make truncation the default approval cutoff, but let voters move
it higher as an option:
45 C
30 A>B or A>>B
25 B
Voting A>>B would be the chicken defense (where sincere is 25 B>A).
Voting A>B would be the truncation defense (where sincere is 45 C>B).
With this option, MDDA would be an FBC compliant method that is truncation
and burial resistant as well as quasi CD compliant.
Is there a way to modify MDDA to make it satisfy mono-add-plump?
How about incorporating some form of power truncation. When you plump X
and reduce the majority victory of Y over Z to a sub-majority, it would
revert to a majority if you counted the common truncation of Y and Z
against each other as even half a point.
Btw, in case you didn't see it, one of my new favorite non-FBC methods is
Most Approved Immune(MAI): Elect the most approved immune candidate.
This means elect the most approved candidate X that is unbeaten pairwise
by the candidate that would win (recursively) if the method were applied to
the same ballot set with X disqualified or withdrawn.
It is the simplest approval based rank method that confers immunity from
second place complaints on its winners.
It is quasi CD compliant if voters can specify their approval cutoffs
above the truncation level when they want to.
A top rank version of this method is fully CD compliant:
Elect the Most Top Ranked Immune candidate. (MTRI)
In other words elect the most top ranked candidate X that is unbeaten
pairwise by the candidate that would win (recursively) if the method were
applied to the same ballot set with X disqualified or withdrawn.
Forest
For this method, MTRI, the procedural definition is more understandable
than the recursive definition (though the recursive definition's brevity
could be useful).
So this is what I understand MTRI's procedural definition to be:
1. Order the candidates by their top-count score, with higher scores at top.
2. Switch the lowest pair of adjacent candidates whose lower candidate
pair-beats the higher one.
Repeat till there are no more pairs to switch. The highest candidate in the
order at that time wins.
-----------------------------------------------
As a CD rank method, this method is a competitor of MDDTR. What are the
property differences between MTRI & MDDTR?
In particular, how does MTRI compare with MDDTR in regards to protection of
a CWs against truncation & burial?
Michael Ossipoff
On Thu, Nov 17, 2016 at 2:55 PM, Forest Simmons <fsimmons@pcc.edu> wrote:
> On Thu, Nov 17, 2016 at 10:54 AM, Michael Ossipoff <email9648742@gmail.com
> > wrote:
>
>> But wouldn't Smith//Approval, with approval cutoffs in the rankings,
>> share MDDTR's burial-vullnerability?
>>
>> ...with, additionally, vulnerability to truncation, which MDDTR _doesn't_
>> have?
>>
>> And Smith//Approval trades MDDTR's FBC for Smith, which I consider an
>> unfavorable trade.
>>
>
> Perhaps make truncation the default approval cutoff, but let voters move
> it higher as an option:
>
> 45 C
> 30 A>B or A>>B
> 25 B
>
> Voting A>>B would be the chicken defense (where sincere is 25 B>A).
>
> Voting A>B would be the truncation defense (where sincere is 45 C>B).
>
> With this option, MDDA would be an FBC compliant method that is truncation
> and burial resistant as well as quasi CD compliant.
>
> Is there a way to modify MDDA to make it satisfy mono-add-plump?
>
> How about incorporating some form of power truncation. When you plump X
> and reduce the majority victory of Y over Z to a sub-majority, it would
> revert to a majority if you counted the common truncation of Y and Z
> against each other as even half a point.
>
> Btw, in case you didn't see it, one of my new favorite non-FBC methods is
> Most Approved Immune(MAI): Elect the most approved immune candidate.
>
> This means elect the most approved candidate X that is unbeaten pairwise
> by the candidate that would win (recursively) if the method were applied to
> the same ballot set with X disqualified or withdrawn.
>
> It is the simplest approval based rank method that confers immunity from
> second place complaints on its winners.
>
> It is quasi CD compliant if voters can specify their approval cutoffs
> above the truncation level when they want to.
>
> A top rank version of this method is fully CD compliant:
>
> Elect the Most Top Ranked Immune candidate. (MTRI)
>
> In other words elect the most top ranked candidate X that is unbeaten
> pairwise by the candidate that would win (recursively) if the method were
> applied to the same ballot set with X disqualified or withdrawn.
>
> Forest
>
>
