Why isn't anyone talking about the elephant in the room?

[rob]

Being that, among the community of experts on better ways to come to a consensus, we are so unable to come to a consensus on which voting methods are best?

It seems so strange and ironic that there is so little effort or interest in having us vote on our favorite voting methods. Meanwhile, things move forward so sloooooowly because we can't come to anything remotely resembling a consensus among ourselves. I don't get it.

I've suggested that, in this community, we each put a signature on our posts that say our preferences, so if someone wants to accumulate them and show which method wins under various methods, they can. I will do this if enough people put it in their signatures.

A couple people did this (@Jack-Waugh and @Marylander ... thanks) while another user suggested making some sort of voting widget to do it (which would have been an awesome suggestion, if it was accompanied by that user also saying "and I volunteer to do this much bigger project than the one you were offering to do!" )

Please note that I've been building Codepens for tabulating different methods, which anyone is welcome to fork and re-share. I've also been building various things, also in easily sharable/forkable Javascript, that visualize results, simulate elections, and so on. Anyone is welcome to build on them or integrate them into your own projects. Anyone is welcome to hold votes using them.

But the main point is, why aren't we holding regular votes?

[Casimir]

One could see it as ironic that experts in voting can't manage to agree on the best voting method. Then laugh and put the topic down.
But, we know that no voting method can force a majority if there is non in the electorate. The same is true for a Condorcet winner or finding a consensus. And going one step further back, maybe there isn't a single answer to that question.

I yesterday started to write two articles about the question, what makes a good voting system? Two articles because I arrived two answers.

The first one very practical.
Let's look at some obvious desirable criteria: satisfaction, fairness and simplicity (Jameson Quinn already wrote about that somewhere). In theory (if we had enough information) we could plot all voting systems on a three dimensional graph. But then the question is, which is the "best"? One might be very fair (resistant to strategy), but give medium satisfaction and is medium complex (e.g. MJ). While another gives good satisfaction and is simple, but easy to manipulate (e.g. score).
Instead of looking for the best one we could exclude every system which is worse than another in all three categories. This leaves us with a pareto front of several voting systems that are reasonably good.
Without having enough data, I guess this could look something like this (from simple to more complex):
approval, score, STAR or 3-2-1, Smith//score, Woodall's or Benhams' method

The second argument is more philosophical.
Since we know that no deterministic voting method can be strategy free we can ask our selves: How do we deal with strategy? While trying to map which voter strategies are possible I came to the conclusion that most fall in one of three categories: Dishonest preferences (favorite betrayal), Chicken Dilemma and Exaggeration.
The last of these is pretty much unavoidable. The other two can be avoided and I think it's important we do. The both represent a failure to cooperate. In terms of game theory, the first as prisoners dilemma, the second as the game of chicken. Failing to cooperate isn't only some obscure quirk in the niche science of voting theory, but actively harmful to society. If we could fully fix this, then this would be a huge advancement to humanity.
So I think, the voting reform movement currently tries to fix the spoiler effect and somewhat improve the selection of the winner. But when we have achieved this and the whole world is using some Condorcet or score method, then we will find that FB and CD are real problems we have to deal with. That this isn't utopia yet.
Finding methods that avoid both problems is hard, because solving CD in a strong sense implies having FB. It is however possible to solve CD in a weak sense.
These method, as far as I can see, achieve this:
ICT, MAV, MCA (some variants), MMPO, SIV
(The next step would be to filter out those that are subject to clones.)

As a bonus argument, one could say that we can avoid strategy altogether with non-deterministic methods. They also are more "fair" in the sense that they give every voter an equal chance of being heard. Therefor the best methods would be:
random ballot, random pair

Now with these arguments alone there are over a dozen methods that could qualify as "best", depending on the definition. So maybe there isn't really an answer to that question and which methods would be wise to use, depends very much on the situation.

[rob]

@casimir said in Why isn't anyone talking about the elephant in the room?:

But, we know that no voting method can force a majority if there is non in the electorate

But a majority isn't necessary. That's kind of the whole point. (this is the exact same situation when voting for human candidates to political offices)

Most of us agree that the status quo, where most elections in the US are FPTP, is bad.

But because we can't find a compromise or consensus or whatever you want to call it, we don't move forward.

I'd think regular "elections" that find out which method or methods are most liked by people in this community would move things forward. I have certain methods I prefer, but I would be happy with others as well. I just don't know which to push forward, or abandon, because we don't do what we should be experts at: vote on it.

Remember, even if a particular voting method wins under every method, that doesn't mean anyone has to do anything. It's not binding in any way. But it is an indication of how the community as a whole is thinking, and could help give us a direction.

And it is also an obvious way to use and learn about the methods we claim to be so interested in.

@casimir said in Why isn't anyone talking about the elephant in the room?:

So maybe there isn't really an answer to that question and which methods would be wise to use, depends very much on the situation.

So..... you mean let's just stick with FPTP then? Because that seems kinda like what you're saying.

[Jack Waugh]

I'm trying to work on a simulator framework that, if I complete it, I hope will help all of us study in a numerical way, the question of what systems are best. Of course, some existing simulations, e. g. the Yee diagrams, VSE/Bayesian regret simulations, etc. do help with such studying and they have given insight. But I have a different angle in mind from which to view the parameters and outcomes.

[rob]

@jack-waugh That's all good, but here I'm specifically talking about holding votes on voting methods. In other words eating out own dog food. Also known as "going meta."

What you are talking about is analyzing methods, but I'm wanting to actually use the methods for what they are designed to do, which is help people come to some sort of agreement or consensus. I think it is sorely needed in this community and find it ironic that we aren't doing much of that.

[Jack Waugh]

Of course, I support your call for using our methods for teasing out some kind of group opinion.

[Toby Pereira]

What I might consider to be "the best" voting method is likely to be different in different circumstances. If we're just talking about a method to elect a single person to a position of public office, then obviously it simplifies the question somewhat.

But other than that, there are e.g. multi-winner methods, elections that can be held online and elections among people who are fairly co-operative with each other and are more likely to seek a consensus.

But anyway, depending on the situation, one might nominate a different best method.

[Jack Waugh]

For the people who live in the United Snakes of America, those circumstances of cooperative groups and so on that you refer to are not Problem #1. Problem #1 is that an interest that is alien to human need or compassion or equity or justice or love or survival, namely capital itself, displaces almost all control by the public at large over the government.

[rob]

@jack-waugh said in Why isn't anyone talking about the elephant in the room?:

Problem #1 is that an interest that is alien to human need or compassion or equity or justice or love or survival, namely capital itself, displaces almost all control by the public at large over the government.

I don't really agree, but more importantly, I find that to be way outside of the scope of what this community is trying to address. I mean you might was well blame "wokeism" or something. All you are doing is inviting political divisiveness which I don't think is helpful.

And if you are speaking of the problems I'm seeing in the US, e.g. polarization and radicalization surrounding politics, I think the other main cause is social media. Which is actually closer to the scope of this community, given that the algorithms behind "likes" and "dislikes" and follows and views, and how they shape the public discourse, has a lot of overlap.

[Jack Waugh]

@rob, from what is in scope, do you think that defeating vote splitting is the top goal?

BTW, in quoting me, you left out the link that I included, which affects the meaning; please add it in. In fact, I will expose it here in a way that can be read without mousing around: http://rangevoting.org/Cash3.html

[rob]

@jack-waugh said in Why isn't anyone talking about the elephant in the room?:

@rob, from what is in scope, do you think that defeating vote splitting is the top goal?

Yes, for the most part. Vote splitting that causes polarization is the worst kind. (some does the opposite, for instance "against voting.")

There are a ton of criteria that are also important, such as reducing the incentive to guess how others will vote.

And marketing. I'd accept a tiny bit of vote splitting in exchange for more uptake of a method.

You wanted me to edit my quote of you to include the embedded link? I didn't remove it, nodeBB did. (People can just scroll up...)

But that article is.... well, trying to be nice here.... It's only support for making money less important -- that money is spent messaging voters how to strategically vote for them -- is an EXTREME stretch.

[Jack Waugh]

. . . and would you agree that the most urgent situations to address with what science and engineering we can muster here are ones where people do not have much tendency toward cooperation unless the system is explicitly designed to reward cooperation over selfishness? Would you agree that game theory predicts pretty well the behavior of voters when there are more than a million of them in the same election, as opposed to a concept like ubuntu predicting it?

[Jack Waugh]

@rob said in Why isn't anyone talking about the elephant in the room?:

money is spent messaging voters how to strategically vote for them

No, the point is that faced with vote splitting, voters seek a bandwagon to join, lest their vote be wasted, and money and fame are the leading indicators of a bandwagon.

I have been thinking that we need a clearer expression of this point than Dr. Smith provided.

[Jack Waugh]

@rob said in Why isn't anyone talking about the elephant in the room?:

I didn't remove it, nodeBB did. (People can just scroll up...)

I didn't shoot you, my gun did.

I'm asking you to edit the link back in, because otherwise you are misquoting me.

Sorry about the "whack a mole" series of posts. Next time, I will try to edit all points into fewer posts.

[rob]

@jack-waugh said in Why isn't anyone talking about the elephant in the room?:

people do not have much tendency toward cooperation unless the system is explicitly designed to reward cooperation over selfishness?

That's not how I'd word it.

I mean, voting your interests under condorcet is still just as selfish as voting your interests under FPTP.

In other contexts, sure, good systems reward (some) cooperative behavior by aligning it with selfish behavior.

Not sure where you are going here, or how it fits with the topic of the thread, which is why don't we use our voting methods to vote on preferred voting methods.

[Jack Waugh]

Here is how it is on topic. You proposed that we vote for what voting system we think is best. Tony P. responded that there is no one best and that it depends on circumstances. I responded to his position on that by saying that there is one set of circumstances that is 100 times as important as the others, and that is public political elections in a large country.

[rob]

@jack-waugh Ok.

Well with regard to @Toby-Pereira 's issue, you know, we can have multiple votes where different scenarios are suggested. An important distinction is single winner and multiple winners, although I am far more interested in the former as it is most directly relevant to current US politics)

But I'd think that you are right is the default is public political elections. Most of the methods I'd advocate are perfectly good for things outside of that, though.

@jack-waugh said in Why isn't anyone talking about the elephant in the room?:

I'm asking you to edit the link back in, because otherwise you are misquoting me.

You can't be serious. I didn't take it out, the designers of our forum determined that was how embedded links should be handled when quoting. I'm certainly not going to hassle with rebuilding your special presentation. No. Not happening. That's absurd....

[Jack Waugh]

@rob should have said in Why isn't anyone talking about the elephant in the room?:

@jack-waugh said in Why isn't anyone talking about the elephant in the room?:

Problem #1 is that an interest that is alien to human need or compassion or equity or justice or love or survival, namely capital itself, displaces almost all control by the public at large over the government.

I don't really agree, but more importantly, I find that to be way outside of the scope of what this community is trying to address. I mean you might was well blame "wokeism" or something. All you are doing is inviting political divisiveness which I don't think is helpful.

And if you are speaking of the problems I'm seeing in the US, e.g. polarization and radicalization surrounding politics, I think the other main cause is social media. Which is actually closer to the scope of this community, given that the algorithms behind "likes" and "dislikes" and follows and views, and how they shape the public discourse, has a lot of overlap.

It wants to bury the corrected quote from me, so let's bring it out:

Problem #1 is that an interest that is alien to human need or compassion or equity or justice or love or survival, namely capital itself, displaces almost all control by the public at large over the government.

The link word is "displaces" and it leads to http://rangevoting.org/Cash3.html by Warren D. Smith, Ph.D. (math).

[rob]

@jack-waugh

Well I certainly don't want to be thought of as "burying" part of your quote.

Just in case anyone thinks I was burying the link because I didn't want to futz around with putting the link back in there (when NodeBB's normal quoting process automatically strips such links), I'll help you make sure that no one misses the link:

Please read this ridiculous article where Warren Smith, in full crackpot mode, argues that the main reason candidates need money is to convince people they are a front runner as opposed to a spoiler. If that was corrected, candidates would have no need to advertise I guess. With the implication that score does this better than RCV or condorcet (etc) because .... ummm.... well just because....

[Jack Waugh]

I have been saying that I need a better-worded article to promote what I consider to be Dr. Smith's main point in that article. And one of the shortcomings of his is that it promotes Score as the only solution, even though I think that is not implied by the point that vote splitting leads the voters to obey the money signal, thereby empowering money.