5 ms·

And hanging chads were a problem why exactly? I.e. why do we need to have machines do something badly that humans can do well?

akira2501 8y ago
I think history shows that we don't actually do it that well, I gave one example from recent history and I think a quick study will show that elections, in general, are easily undermined. We want machines because they are indifferent. We can develop machine based voting systems that have a voter-verifiable receipt. We can reduce the cost of our elections and reduce the number of trusted people that must be involved with them. It removes the most common sources of error from our current flawed implementation of our democratic ideals. Expanding upon this, if we make voting cheap and easy enough, we may actually be able to expand our democracy for more direct participation at all levels of government and reduce our reliance on the currently flawed implementation of our representative system. Why would we _not_ want this? The major problem, as I see it, is that states are not assembling expert panels to either purchase or work with other states to collaboratively build a good system directly. The government purchasing process certainly plays a factor here as well, and voting systems should be classified as critical infrastructure to allow a more rational approach to their procurement and/or development.
- romwell 8y ago
  Objection: machines are only as indifferent as the people who make or control them. On top of that, they are opaque: it's very hard to verify that a machine does what it claims to do and nothing else. If you like machines, I present you a perfect machine: it's a clear box into which you throw paper ballots. It even counts the ballots: invariably, the result is "akira2501 won" - that is written on the outside; it works instantaneously. Any party that finds it suspicious can challenge and recount the paper ballots inside, in presence of independent observers. Since there's no better way to verify the work of a voting machine other than counting papers, this machine is as good as any machine you just described - and is definitely cheap. As for the cost - citation needed that machines actually provide any savings here.
squiggleblaz 8y ago
I assume it's because Americans have too many elections on one day. Most other countries run local and state elections on separate days, and have far fewer elected officers (usually just legislative). Most of those which do have elected executive officers hold those elections on another day (since the result is better for the president if they are elected a few weeks before the legislature).[1] I think only the US has elected judicial and law enforcement officers, which is actually scary to foreigners. If you have half the number of elections on two days, you can count all the ballots with half the number of people and still get a result by the end of the night. [1]: There's a few reasons for this. One is that a lot of people will say "okay, i'll give this person a chance" and even though they voted for the losing candidate, they decide to vote for the president's party in the legislature. Another is that if you ask people who they voted for, more people say the winner than actually voted for the winner. It seems there is some sort of problem of memory reliability here. Since more people believe they voted for the president than actually did, more people will happily support the presidents party than otherwise would have, had the election been synchronised.

akira2501 8y ago

I think history shows that we don't actually do it that well, I gave one example from recent history and I think a quick study will show that elections, in general, are easily undermined. We want machines because they are indifferent. We can develop machine based voting systems that have a voter-verifiable receipt. We can reduce the cost of our elections and reduce the number of trusted people that must be involved with them. It removes the most common sources of error from our current flawed implementation of our democratic ideals. Expanding upon this, if we make voting cheap and easy enough, we may actually be able to expand our democracy for more direct participation at all levels of government and reduce our reliance on the currently flawed implementation of our representative system. Why would we _not_ want this? The major problem, as I see it, is that states are not assembling expert panels to either purchase or work with other states to collaboratively build a good system directly. The government purchasing process certainly plays a factor here as well, and voting systems should be classified as critical infrastructure to allow a more rational approach to their procurement and/or development.

romwell 8y ago
Objection: machines are only as indifferent as the people who make or control them. On top of that, they are opaque: it's very hard to verify that a machine does what it claims to do and nothing else. If you like machines, I present you a perfect machine: it's a clear box into which you throw paper ballots. It even counts the ballots: invariably, the result is "akira2501 won" - that is written on the outside; it works instantaneously. Any party that finds it suspicious can challenge and recount the paper ballots inside, in presence of independent observers. Since there's no better way to verify the work of a voting machine other than counting papers, this machine is as good as any machine you just described - and is definitely cheap. As for the cost - citation needed that machines actually provide any savings here.

squiggleblaz 8y ago

I assume it's because Americans have too many elections on one day. Most other countries run local and state elections on separate days, and have far fewer elected officers (usually just legislative). Most of those which do have elected executive officers hold those elections on another day (since the result is better for the president if they are elected a few weeks before the legislature).[1] I think only the US has elected judicial and law enforcement officers, which is actually scary to foreigners. If you have half the number of elections on two days, you can count all the ballots with half the number of people and still get a result by the end of the night. [1]: There's a few reasons for this. One is that a lot of people will say "okay, i'll give this person a chance" and even though they voted for the losing candidate, they decide to vote for the president's party in the legislature. Another is that if you ask people who they voted for, more people say the winner than actually voted for the winner. It seems there is some sort of problem of memory reliability here. Since more people believe they voted for the president than actually did, more people will happily support the presidents party than otherwise would have, had the election been synchronised.