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I hugely support electronic voting. Electronic voting makes it possible to implement superior voting methods, like condorcet systems. These systems are difficul

I hugely support electronic voting. Electronic voting makes it possible to implement superior voting methods, like condorcet systems. These systems are difficult or impossible to implement by hand, but trivial to do with a computer. Properly done, a voting machine doesn't need to do anything more than count and tabulate. You press a button, and it adds a new vote to it's table. The vote could be printed out on paper. It could even be done via punch cards first, and then fed into the voting machine (which makes the process more inspectable by humans.) The voting machine need not know what each candidate even is, what party they are, just assign them numbers. And it doesn't need to receive updates, or have any method of input other than reading punched cards or a voter pressing a button. It certainly doesn't need to be based on windows XP and have usb inputs. It certainly shouldn't send votes over wifi.

pjc50 10y ago
What would you prefer, a Condorcet election which nobody believes is fair or FPTP election where everyone can count the ballots? I think pushing for "superior voting systems" is really allowing the best to be the enemy of the good here. STV is perfectly doable by hand. AMS is only fractionally more complicated than FPTP. But most US elections (and the UK parliamentary ones, although none of the other kinds of election in the UK) are FPTP. Let's not allow the desire for better voting systems to be tied to untrustworthy technology. Edit: the barrier for getting a system adopted has to be "can you explain this to a partisan of the opposing faction with a high school education, and get them to agree that it's fair?"
- Houshalter 10y ago
  If you read my comment, you see I don't believe these are mutually exclusive at all. There's no reason a voting machine could be made reasonably tamper proof. Or at the very least, air gapped and uncaring of the names of the candidate. It literally only needs to be a tabulating machine for punched cards, or something similar. I really dislike instant runoff voting and similar systems like STV. They are better than FPTP, but not by much. One big issue is discussed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Q7rzqJ0YS8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Q7rzqJ0YS8 But my main concern is they might tend to elect more extreme candidates, because they quickly drop candidates that don't have enough first votes, even if they are everyone's second vote.
  - pjc50 10y ago
    Ideal election system > paper count with representatives of the party > actually existing electronic voting. The problems of actual existing electronic voting are a microcosm of bigger problems. We get insecure, ineffective voting machines because procurement is difficult and tends to be captured by lobbyists. Condorcet superiority seems not all that important in practice: http://www.fairvote.org/why-the-condorcet-criterion-is-less-important-than-it-seems http://www.fairvote.org/why-the-condorcet-criterion-is-less-... , and if you have suitable multi-member constituencies for STV then you tend to end up with a couple of "extremists" and a large group of moderates in the middle. Again, let's not let the best be the enemy of the good.
    - Houshalter 10y ago
      The article you linked to goes on and on about the exact issue I mentioned. IRV tends to select for extremist candidates. Condorcet methods tend to punish them. The article tries to defend this, but I see this as a very bad outcome. Extremist candidates can do much more harm than good. Centrist candidates are more rational and tend to be less likely to do crazy things. Condorcet methods ensure the winner will be the best possible compromise, IRV gives very inconsistent behavior but can favor extremists, but can also punish third parties (IRV still suffers from vote splitting in many cases, see video I posted.)
Houshalter 10y ago
@hellbanned user, that's a good idea and seems to solve the problem. The voting machine just producing punch cards for a separate counting machine allows for easy human inspection of votes and auditing. I think such a system would be pretty secure. Don't throw the baby out with the bath water. Just because current electronic voting is bad, doesn't mean it has to be.
Asooka 10y ago
Why not a hybrid? Anonymous paper ballots counted by machines. First, you enter your vote in a machine and it spits out a punch card. The punch card must have a single hole on it clearly corresponding to choice X, or no holes and a name printed in OCR type in case of a write-in vote. The punch cards are collected and then taken to a vote counting machine which tallies the votes with no knowledge of voter identities. Basically the problem is with data being kept in an opaque digital database, not with vote tallying being done by a machine. If we can keep the database in a form that's untamperable and final, there's no problem with using machines to do the vote counting.
eli_gottlieb 10y ago
Approval voting has nice theoretical properties and is simple as dirt to do by hand.
- Houshalter 10y ago
  Approval voting is hugely vulnerable to tactile voting. Otherwise it seems OK.
  - ClayShentrup 10y ago
    Ludicrous. Bayesian Regret results for instance show Approval Voting doing quite well even with 100% strategic voting. http://scorevoting.net/BayRegsFig.html http://scorevoting.net/BayRegsFig.html There is even a theorem that, under plausible models of voter strategy, Approval Voting will tend to elect Condorcet winners (i.e. candidates who beat all rivals by a head-to-head majority). http://scorevoting.net/AppCW.html http://scorevoting.net/AppCW.html Clay Shentrup Co-founder, The Center for Election Science

pjc50 10y ago

What would you prefer, a Condorcet election which nobody believes is fair or FPTP election where everyone can count the ballots? I think pushing for "superior voting systems" is really allowing the best to be the enemy of the good here. STV is perfectly doable by hand. AMS is only fractionally more complicated than FPTP. But most US elections (and the UK parliamentary ones, although none of the other kinds of election in the UK) are FPTP. Let's not allow the desire for better voting systems to be tied to untrustworthy technology. Edit: the barrier for getting a system adopted has to be "can you explain this to a partisan of the opposing faction with a high school education, and get them to agree that it's fair?"

Houshalter 10y ago
If you read my comment, you see I don't believe these are mutually exclusive at all. There's no reason a voting machine could be made reasonably tamper proof. Or at the very least, air gapped and uncaring of the names of the candidate. It literally only needs to be a tabulating machine for punched cards, or something similar. I really dislike instant runoff voting and similar systems like STV. They are better than FPTP, but not by much. One big issue is discussed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Q7rzqJ0YS8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Q7rzqJ0YS8 But my main concern is they might tend to elect more extreme candidates, because they quickly drop candidates that don't have enough first votes, even if they are everyone's second vote.
- pjc50 10y ago
  Ideal election system > paper count with representatives of the party > actually existing electronic voting. The problems of actual existing electronic voting are a microcosm of bigger problems. We get insecure, ineffective voting machines because procurement is difficult and tends to be captured by lobbyists. Condorcet superiority seems not all that important in practice: http://www.fairvote.org/why-the-condorcet-criterion-is-less-important-than-it-seems http://www.fairvote.org/why-the-condorcet-criterion-is-less-... , and if you have suitable multi-member constituencies for STV then you tend to end up with a couple of "extremists" and a large group of moderates in the middle. Again, let's not let the best be the enemy of the good.
  - Houshalter 10y ago
    The article you linked to goes on and on about the exact issue I mentioned. IRV tends to select for extremist candidates. Condorcet methods tend to punish them. The article tries to defend this, but I see this as a very bad outcome. Extremist candidates can do much more harm than good. Centrist candidates are more rational and tend to be less likely to do crazy things. Condorcet methods ensure the winner will be the best possible compromise, IRV gives very inconsistent behavior but can favor extremists, but can also punish third parties (IRV still suffers from vote splitting in many cases, see video I posted.)

Houshalter 10y ago

@hellbanned user, that's a good idea and seems to solve the problem. The voting machine just producing punch cards for a separate counting machine allows for easy human inspection of votes and auditing. I think such a system would be pretty secure. Don't throw the baby out with the bath water. Just because current electronic voting is bad, doesn't mean it has to be.

Asooka 10y ago

Why not a hybrid? Anonymous paper ballots counted by machines. First, you enter your vote in a machine and it spits out a punch card. The punch card must have a single hole on it clearly corresponding to choice X, or no holes and a name printed in OCR type in case of a write-in vote. The punch cards are collected and then taken to a vote counting machine which tallies the votes with no knowledge of voter identities. Basically the problem is with data being kept in an opaque digital database, not with vote tallying being done by a machine. If we can keep the database in a form that's untamperable and final, there's no problem with using machines to do the vote counting.

eli_gottlieb 10y ago

Approval voting has nice theoretical properties and is simple as dirt to do by hand.

Houshalter 10y ago
Approval voting is hugely vulnerable to tactile voting. Otherwise it seems OK.
- ClayShentrup 10y ago
  Ludicrous. Bayesian Regret results for instance show Approval Voting doing quite well even with 100% strategic voting. http://scorevoting.net/BayRegsFig.html http://scorevoting.net/BayRegsFig.html There is even a theorem that, under plausible models of voter strategy, Approval Voting will tend to elect Condorcet winners (i.e. candidates who beat all rivals by a head-to-head majority). http://scorevoting.net/AppCW.html http://scorevoting.net/AppCW.html Clay Shentrup Co-founder, The Center for Election Science