4 ms·

ATW, score voting (which some call range voting) and approval voting both suffer from the defect that a choice that is favored by an absolute majority (which wo

ATW, score voting (which some call range voting) and approval voting both suffer from the defect that a choice that is favored by an absolute majority (which would thus win in a "normal" election) can wind up losing. That wouldn't have to happen very often to lead to a lot of very angry voters.

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notriddle 5y ago
Australia’s system (IRV) doesn’t necessarily elect the Condorcet winner, either, and it hasn’t led to mass revolts.
- bedobi 5y ago
  Well, you have to be aware of the potential quirks in the system, and Australians are not, they uncritically know their system is infallible and the best.
dodobirdlord 5y ago
How can approval voting suffer from this defect? Is the idea here that we factor in people who don’t vote for things they actually favor because they’re hoping to avoid tipping the result away from something they favor even more? Or do you mean an election could end up selecting a result that is favored by the majority even though there is a different result that is more favored by a smaller majority?
- Turing_Machine 5y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Approval_voting#Effect_on_elections https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Approval_voting#Effect_on_elec...
  - DennisP 5y ago
    But from that link, this is considered an advantage "by advocates of approval voting, as it chooses centrist candidates with broad appeal rather than polarizing candidates who appeal only to the majority."
    - Turing_Machine 5y ago
      That the system's advocates see it as an advantage does not alter the fact that others see it as a severe disadvantage. I assure you that if a person's preferred candidate loses under this system, while that candidate would have won under a straight majority/plurality system, that person is going to be extremely upset.
      - DennisP 5y ago
        Yes, people have differing opinions. I thought it was a reasonable point though. If the criterion for a good voting system is that it should provide the same results as plurality, then I guess we should just use plurality. But I don't think that's a very good criterion.
      - ClayShentrup 5y ago
        The people who see it as a disadvantage are just objectively mathematically wrong.
ClayShentrup 5y ago
In practice, approval voting and score voting will almost always elect the Condorcet winner. Possible even more often than real Condorcet methods. http://www.rangevoting.org/AppCW http://www.rangevoting.org/AppCW
ClayShentrup 5y ago
This isn't a defect, it's a benefit. It's mathematically proven that an electorate can prefer X even if a majority of its members prefer Y. Commonly proposed "majoritarian" methods using rankings can, for instance, elect X even though Y is preferred to X by a huge majority of voters and Y has twice as many first-place votes as X. http://scorevoting.net/CoreSuppPocket http://scorevoting.net/CoreSuppPocket And there's not even a clear mathematical definition of "majority winner". https://web.archive.org/web/20190219005032/https://sites.google.com/a/electology.org/www/utilitarian-majoritarian https://web.archive.org/web/20190219005032/https://sites.goo... The goal of voting methods is to produce the most satisfying results possible (highest expected utility). And score/approval voting are excellent at that, and also radically simpler than ranked methods. https://electionscience.org/library/approval-voting-versus-irv/ https://electionscience.org/library/approval-voting-versus-i... https://rpubs.com/Jameson-Quinn/VSE5key https://rpubs.com/Jameson-Quinn/VSE5key https://medium.com/election-science/star-voting-is-simpler-than-irv-84b8990986f2 https://medium.com/election-science/star-voting-is-simpler-t... etc.

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notriddle 5y ago

Australia’s system (IRV) doesn’t necessarily elect the Condorcet winner, either, and it hasn’t led to mass revolts.

bedobi 5y ago
Well, you have to be aware of the potential quirks in the system, and Australians are not, they uncritically know their system is infallible and the best.

dodobirdlord 5y ago

How can approval voting suffer from this defect? Is the idea here that we factor in people who don’t vote for things they actually favor because they’re hoping to avoid tipping the result away from something they favor even more? Or do you mean an election could end up selecting a result that is favored by the majority even though there is a different result that is more favored by a smaller majority?

Turing_Machine 5y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Approval_voting#Effect_on_elections https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Approval_voting#Effect_on_elec...
- DennisP 5y ago
  But from that link, this is considered an advantage "by advocates of approval voting, as it chooses centrist candidates with broad appeal rather than polarizing candidates who appeal only to the majority."
  - Turing_Machine 5y ago
    That the system's advocates see it as an advantage does not alter the fact that others see it as a severe disadvantage. I assure you that if a person's preferred candidate loses under this system, while that candidate would have won under a straight majority/plurality system, that person is going to be extremely upset.
    - DennisP 5y ago
      Yes, people have differing opinions. I thought it was a reasonable point though. If the criterion for a good voting system is that it should provide the same results as plurality, then I guess we should just use plurality. But I don't think that's a very good criterion.
    - ClayShentrup 5y ago
      The people who see it as a disadvantage are just objectively mathematically wrong.

ClayShentrup 5y ago

In practice, approval voting and score voting will almost always elect the Condorcet winner. Possible even more often than real Condorcet methods. http://www.rangevoting.org/AppCW http://www.rangevoting.org/AppCW

ClayShentrup 5y ago

This isn't a defect, it's a benefit. It's mathematically proven that an electorate can prefer X even if a majority of its members prefer Y. Commonly proposed "majoritarian" methods using rankings can, for instance, elect X even though Y is preferred to X by a huge majority of voters and Y has twice as many first-place votes as X. http://scorevoting.net/CoreSuppPocket http://scorevoting.net/CoreSuppPocket And there's not even a clear mathematical definition of "majority winner". https://web.archive.org/web/20190219005032/https://sites.google.com/a/electology.org/www/utilitarian-majoritarian https://web.archive.org/web/20190219005032/https://sites.goo... The goal of voting methods is to produce the most satisfying results possible (highest expected utility). And score/approval voting are excellent at that, and also radically simpler than ranked methods. https://electionscience.org/library/approval-voting-versus-irv/ https://electionscience.org/library/approval-voting-versus-i... https://rpubs.com/Jameson-Quinn/VSE5key https://rpubs.com/Jameson-Quinn/VSE5key https://medium.com/election-science/star-voting-is-simpler-than-irv-84b8990986f2 https://medium.com/election-science/star-voting-is-simpler-t... etc.