5 ms·

there are many many uses of my time that can affect changes to make the world a better place if nothing else I can spend that time being a better parent and sp

by pitt1980 12y ago

there are many many uses of my time that can affect changes to make the world a better place if nothing else I can spend that time being a better parent and spouse voting ranks extremely low on the active uses of my time to make the world a better place

snowwrestler 12y ago
Voting takes little time (about 15-30 minutes in my precinct) but has a lasting effect for years. Measured on a per-minute basis, there are few ways you can have as large an impact as voting.
- pitt1980 12y ago
  little time, and even less impact
- glenra 12y ago
  What "lasting effect" does it have, given that the vote changes nothing? Are you just referring to the effect it has on the voter, which is that it makes him or her a bit less rational?
  - snowwrestler 12y ago
    I don't think it's very rational to say that a vote "changes nothing," but I also don't think there's anything I could post that would change your mind, so I guess we'll just agree to disagree on this one.
    - glenra 12y ago
      At a national level, the chance of your vote changing the outcome is less than your chance of being struck by lightning or killed by a plane falling on you. Most votes aren't even close at all - you knew what candidate your state would pick going in and it picked that by a margin of, say, a million votes. But hey, let's suppose one of those few, rare, much less than once-in-a-lifetime cases comes up where the vote is so close that your one vote WOULD make a difference. In that case we can say two things: (1) that outcome is closer than the margin of error on our vote-counting technology, so the outcome will actually get decided in the courts (2) If the country is THAT divided between the two candidates, they're probably so similarly positioned on the {net good/net bad} scale that your vote didn't really matter then either - you got to pick which of two functionally-identical candidates we got. (or if they're not, they're close ENOUGH that you have no way of being sure you made the right choice between them - you'd do as well to flip a coin. Rationally speaking, the effect of voting for a candidate is identical to the effect of rooting for a sports team. It does nothing to modify the outcome of the match, but it does make YOU have a bit more ego invested in whoever you picked.
      - snowwrestler 12y ago
        These sort of comparisons are often trotted out in voting arguments, but they are a misapplication of probability because a vote is not something that happens to you, it is something you do. And because votes are fungible, there is no way to pick out one vote and say that it mattered more than any other. The issue is not chance, it is apportionment: to what degree can you claim responsibility for the final outcome of an election? And what you're saying is that in elections where your portion is very small, you don't think it's worth participating. To me this seems like a rather self-centered approach to civic engagement, essentially saying "I won't participate in any process that does not sufficiently validate my importance." And is there a value at which you would think it is worth participating? That would imply that the smaller and less consequential the election, the more likely it is that you would participate. That seems like a weird way to set priorities. And it's worth noting that no matter how small each portion may be, it will still be larger than the portion of those who did not vote at all. The argument from small apportionment also assumes that everyone else still votes (that's why the portion is so small, after all). So it can't work as a general argument against the utility of voting. In fact if everyone tried to follow that strategy, any defector would wield enormous power, as one of few people bothering to vote.
        glenra 12y ago
        I agree with the arguments of Henry David Thoreau and of Lysander Spooner to the effect that voting is fundamentally an immoral act. To vote, above all else, is to broadcast your own acceptance of the outcome and willingness to abide by it. So from a moral perspective, I should only vote if doing so has a sufficiently strong chance of averting some even greater evil. But setting morality aside and just assessing the expected value, I should want to vote more when the expected value is large, which is to say when I have BOTH (a) a decent chance of affecting the outcome, AND (b) some good reason to think my vote is much better informed than that of the average voter. If - case (a) - my vote is one of millions, I have no reason to expect it to CHANGE the result. If - case (b) - my vote isn't above average in terms of how well-informed I am and how carefully I've thought it through, I have no reason to think adding mine to the mix will IMPROVE the result, even if it DID change the outcome. For most people and most elections most of the time, neither (a) nor (b) applies; they should not vote. Your last paragraph suggests the use of Kant's categorical imperative, which not a great guide to action. To illustrate why: suppose our question at hand is "should I walk on the grass?" If I do, I will enjoy the feeling of grass between my toes, but if EVERYBODY walked on the grass, the grass would die and we would lose not just its usefulness and that nice feeling but also its beauty. So applying Kant says I shouldn't walk on the grass, right? But wait! There are more likely options in the world than EVERYBODY or NOBODY should walk on the grass; there's also the option that SOME people walk on the grass. If we test the rule "people SUFFICIENTLY LIKE ME should walk on the grass", that works fine when you universalize it! Then we get the prettiness for all AND the nice feelings for some and the grass survives. So to return to voting: not everybody should vote. SOME people should vote. Which ones? People who really ENJOY doing so, and people who have reason to think it will be a close race AND are especially well-informed or otherwise have reason to think their vote helps much more than average. I'm in neither of those categories, so I shouldn't vote.

snowwrestler 12y ago

Voting takes little time (about 15-30 minutes in my precinct) but has a lasting effect for years. Measured on a per-minute basis, there are few ways you can have as large an impact as voting.

pitt1980 12y ago
little time, and even less impact
glenra 12y ago
What "lasting effect" does it have, given that the vote changes nothing? Are you just referring to the effect it has on the voter, which is that it makes him or her a bit less rational?
- snowwrestler 12y ago
  I don't think it's very rational to say that a vote "changes nothing," but I also don't think there's anything I could post that would change your mind, so I guess we'll just agree to disagree on this one.
  - glenra 12y ago
    At a national level, the chance of your vote changing the outcome is less than your chance of being struck by lightning or killed by a plane falling on you. Most votes aren't even close at all - you knew what candidate your state would pick going in and it picked that by a margin of, say, a million votes. But hey, let's suppose one of those few, rare, much less than once-in-a-lifetime cases comes up where the vote is so close that your one vote WOULD make a difference. In that case we can say two things: (1) that outcome is closer than the margin of error on our vote-counting technology, so the outcome will actually get decided in the courts (2) If the country is THAT divided between the two candidates, they're probably so similarly positioned on the {net good/net bad} scale that your vote didn't really matter then either - you got to pick which of two functionally-identical candidates we got. (or if they're not, they're close ENOUGH that you have no way of being sure you made the right choice between them - you'd do as well to flip a coin. Rationally speaking, the effect of voting for a candidate is identical to the effect of rooting for a sports team. It does nothing to modify the outcome of the match, but it does make YOU have a bit more ego invested in whoever you picked.
    - snowwrestler 12y ago
      These sort of comparisons are often trotted out in voting arguments, but they are a misapplication of probability because a vote is not something that happens to you, it is something you do. And because votes are fungible, there is no way to pick out one vote and say that it mattered more than any other. The issue is not chance, it is apportionment: to what degree can you claim responsibility for the final outcome of an election? And what you're saying is that in elections where your portion is very small, you don't think it's worth participating. To me this seems like a rather self-centered approach to civic engagement, essentially saying "I won't participate in any process that does not sufficiently validate my importance." And is there a value at which you would think it is worth participating? That would imply that the smaller and less consequential the election, the more likely it is that you would participate. That seems like a weird way to set priorities. And it's worth noting that no matter how small each portion may be, it will still be larger than the portion of those who did not vote at all. The argument from small apportionment also assumes that everyone else still votes (that's why the portion is so small, after all). So it can't work as a general argument against the utility of voting. In fact if everyone tried to follow that strategy, any defector would wield enormous power, as one of few people bothering to vote.
      - glenra 12y ago
        I agree with the arguments of Henry David Thoreau and of Lysander Spooner to the effect that voting is fundamentally an immoral act. To vote, above all else, is to broadcast your own acceptance of the outcome and willingness to abide by it. So from a moral perspective, I should only vote if doing so has a sufficiently strong chance of averting some even greater evil. But setting morality aside and just assessing the expected value, I should want to vote more when the expected value is large, which is to say when I have BOTH (a) a decent chance of affecting the outcome, AND (b) some good reason to think my vote is much better informed than that of the average voter. If - case (a) - my vote is one of millions, I have no reason to expect it to CHANGE the result. If - case (b) - my vote isn't above average in terms of how well-informed I am and how carefully I've thought it through, I have no reason to think adding mine to the mix will IMPROVE the result, even if it DID change the outcome. For most people and most elections most of the time, neither (a) nor (b) applies; they should not vote. Your last paragraph suggests the use of Kant's categorical imperative, which not a great guide to action. To illustrate why: suppose our question at hand is "should I walk on the grass?" If I do, I will enjoy the feeling of grass between my toes, but if EVERYBODY walked on the grass, the grass would die and we would lose not just its usefulness and that nice feeling but also its beauty. So applying Kant says I shouldn't walk on the grass, right? But wait! There are more likely options in the world than EVERYBODY or NOBODY should walk on the grass; there's also the option that SOME people walk on the grass. If we test the rule "people SUFFICIENTLY LIKE ME should walk on the grass", that works fine when you universalize it! Then we get the prettiness for all AND the nice feelings for some and the grass survives. So to return to voting: not everybody should vote. SOME people should vote. Which ones? People who really ENJOY doing so, and people who have reason to think it will be a close race AND are especially well-informed or otherwise have reason to think their vote helps much more than average. I'm in neither of those categories, so I shouldn't vote.