Talk:Majority favorite criterion

message: This is not a useful statement, as it applies to any criterion. If it were useful to be in an article, it should go on every criterion page, not just the criterion that is failed by User:Fahrenheit451's favorite voting method. RSpeer 14:59, Apr 25, 2005 (UTC)
User:Rspeer|RSpeer is back to false accusations and POV editing. It is a useful statement because it is true and I would agree that such statements should qualify voting method criteria. So we are not disagreeing on the truth of the statement, but rather if it is "useful" or not. --Fahrenheit451 15:04, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: My other favorites are the Approval voting methods. These are easier for most folks to understand and deal with. e.i. There are some who are revolted at the thought of having to score all candidates on a ballot, even though they were nominated by their parties and should be given their due. CSSD is the same as the Schulze method.  I think Borda works very well for elections with pre-screened candidates and honest voters.  There aren't many political scenarios where those conditions are extant, so some variety of AV is the way to go.  We certainly agree on the worst ones.  --Fahrenheit451 22:25, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)

text: I never was interested in going to war over that point.--Fahrenheit451 22:25, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: "This criterion is not accepted by all voting theorists"

message: I notice that the change 02:01, December 23, 2006 by 71.252.99.34 added that range voting does not satisfy Majority criterion.  There is a current issue as to the factuality of this on the range voting page.  Does anyone have a citation to back up this claim?  Thanks.  WilliamKF 23:48, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Range Voting 

message: The previous wording of the criterion makes reference to "preferences" and "sincere voting" that are not valid elements of a voting criterion.  Voting criterion should only refer to ballots and results.  I added an alternate wording of the criterion (taken from one of the previously included external links, and referenced accordingly) that allows it to apply to non-rank methods.  I also removed the example of Approval voting because it does not serve as a valid counter-example, given the corrected wording.  I am reasonably sure that my changes  are all factually correct, but am certainly open to being proven wrong here on the talk page.  --Sapphic 19:47, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Non-rank ballots 

message: Quite recently, the Election Methods Interest Group was organized, and it has so far attracted as members a few prominent election methods experts and at least one political scientist, and, knowing this community, I expect that we will see membership from many of the published writers and theorists in this field.
Membership in EMIG is open to all persons interested in the topic; however EMIG is developing a structure to address the noise problem in large-scale discussions. Cutting to the chase, EMIG can be thought of as a voluntary association of a series of individual "meetings." Each meeting is autonomous and self-defined. The goal is for all interested persons to register as members of EMIG at the top level (right now, that means subscribing to the EMIG mailing list), but that specific discussions are channeled to independent lists, virtual committees they might be called. EMIG has a delegable proxy mechanism in place, which allows, if used, all members to be represented in every discussion (ideally), without requiring personal and continual attention. So it is not time-expensive to belong to EMIG, you could join, look around, name a proxy you consider reasonably trustworthy, and then set your list membership to Special Notices. You would get hardly any traffic. Your proxy would let you know if something needs your personal attention.
So, if you are interested in editing articles on Election Methods, here on Wikipedia, other than simple grammatical and cleanup work, you may be interested in joining EMIG. There is a Wikipedia committee that has been formed, EMIG-Wikipedia, and a topic was opened there on the Majority Criterion, to attempt to settle, or at least explore in depth, differences of opinion that have appeared here. All are welcome to participate.
EMIG is not going to issue any controlling opinion, but if a Report is issued from the discussions of any EMIG committee, and if that report is accepted with the general agreement of a large body of election methods experts, reporting that consensus can be done by anyone, with clear implied authority, similar to a publication in a peer-reviewed journal.
Instead of having mere assertions about what "election experts believe," we can actually find out. Here are the links:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/electionmethods/ is the top-level EMIG list and is where the proxy table is currently kept as well.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EMIG-Wikipedia is the Wikipedia committee.
Before posting to EMIG itself or a committee list, please consider reading the history of posts for EMIG as a whole and for the committee in question.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Abd (talk • contribs) 01:52, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Discussion of Majority Criterion opening on EMIG-Wikipedia 

message: ...as explained in the third paragraph (and elsewhere):
The application of the majority criterion to methods which cannot provide a full ranking, such as Approval voting, is disputed.
79.69.36.210 (talk) 17:33, 8 May 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Not objective 

message: I've taken out two "examples" of majority voting, which didn't fit the definition.
With candidates XYZ with 39%,20%,41% first preference and 10%,80%,10% second preferences, 59% prefer Y to Z and 61% prefer Y to X ie a majority prefer Y to any other candidate (though a different majority). Under FPTP and IRV, Z would be elected, so do not meet this criterion as defined. Stephen B Streater (talk) 07:15, 28 May 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: It seems to me that you mixed up the majority criterion and the Condorcet criterion. Markus Schulze 09:47, 28 May 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: The criterion states that if there is a single candidate preferred by a majority of voters to all other candidates, then that candidate should win. In My case, candidate Y is preferred by a majority of voters to all other candidates. At least, I think the wording could be clarified (hence the title). Should it be: The criterion states that if there is a single candidate preferred by a majority of voters to all other candidates combined, then that candidate should win? Stephen B Streater (talk) 21:00, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

text:  I think you may be confusing majority with plurarity - see Majority: A majority, also known as a simple majority in the U.S., is a subset of a group consisting of more than half of the group. This should not be confused with a plurality, which is a subset having the largest number of parts. A plurality is not necessarily a majority, as the largest subset may be less than half of the entire group. Stephen B Streater (talk) 21:06, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

text:  In the case I gave above, Y is preferred by a majority to every other candidate, but would not be elected by FPTP or IRV, so this proves that (under the definition given) these do not meet the majority criterion. Stephen B Streater (talk) 21:06, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

text: I've now changed the definition to match the cite - namely that the same majority has prefer the candidate - not just a majority. Stephen B Streater (talk) 21:14, 28 May 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Clarification of meaning 

message: There is a caveat at the bottom of the section on Approval voting, which illustrates with an example that candidate A with majority support can always be elected under Approval voting if his voters approve of him and only him on their ballots. This statement should be obvious: If there are N voters, and the majority supporting A votes this way, A will receive more than N/2 approval votes, and all other candidates must receive less than N/2 approval votes. In this sense, Approval satisfies the weaker claim that a candidate with majority support can always be elected via strategic voting on the part of his followers. This caveat is what leads to Approval's majority criterion status being listed as 'Ambiguous' on the Voting Systems Wikipedia page.
Range Voting satisfies exactly the same claim: If a majority of voters rank candidate A first, they can always force candidate A to win but giving A the maximum score allowable and all other candidates a score of 0 on their ballots. Yet, Range Voting's Maj. Crit. status is not listed as 'Ambiguous' on the Voting Systems page, and there was no such caveat for the example on this page until I added one in an edit.
That edit was swiftly deleted last month by Marcus Schulze, possibly due to a misunderstanding that I claimed Range satisfied the criterion. I have tried to make the wording more clear if that is the case. I would appreciate an explanation as to why it was deleted by him (or anyone else, if there is indeed something wrong in the statement).
66.131.184.130 (talk) 19:44, 26 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Please give a reference where the majority criterion is defined in this manner. Markus Schulze 00:13, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

text: With the same justification, you could say that the Borda count satisfies the majority criterion. Markus Schulze 15:06, 8 October 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: See the non-ranked section above. This caveat is based on what I've called definition 3 of the criterion. Although Schulze is technically incorrect (Borda does not satisfy the criterion under this definition), I think that his underlying point is valid: this is an indefensible argument. I've removed references to this line of argument from the voting systems table. Homunq (talk) 19:33, 28 June 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Approval Voting Caveat and it's applicability to Range Voting

message: ~Q: Can someone give a citation for the controversy section before I consider removing it?
~Q: I am failing to understand why any editor or theorist would advocate an interpretation of Majority that precludes the voter's preference? How can we possibly create a mathematical model of voting systems that preclude the voters themselves? What value could this possibly have, if we are not modeling the very subject matter at hand? Is it not axiomatic that voting systems are about choice amongst options by voters? How can we possibly not include in our model that voters have preferences amongst these options?
Approval experts tell us that if a voter prefers A>B>C then 'A'  is a ballot marking and 'AB' are valid ballot markings.Filingpro (talk) 04:07, 22 May 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Citation For "Controversy" re: Approval??? How can we disregard voter's preferences? 

message: 2nd paragraph in article, re: ordinal voting systems that pass the majority criterion (e.g. IRV, Condorcet etc.) may fail the majority criterion due to the voters incentive to "strategically rearrange their rankings"...
I am having difficulty coming up with an example.
I believe that if there is a majority that prefers candidate A first, then there is no strategic incentive for the majority to rank candidate A anything other than first. If they do so, there is no counter-strategy for the minority. Candidate A will always be elected and the majority criterion is always satisfied.
I will wait for comments before removing the paragraph.
Filingpro (talk) 16:43, 19 July 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  False claim re: strategic voting in IRV/Condorcet leading to failure of majority criterion? 

message: 3rd paragraph:
"The majority criterion was originally defined in relation to methods which rely only on voted preference orders of the candidates. Thus, its application to methods which give weight to preference strength is in some cases disputed."
Q: What does adding "weight" to preference strength have to do with difficulty in applying the majority criterion?
It seems to me, the reason for ambiguity, if at all, is the ability to give two candidates an equal rating on a rating ballot. When the voter does this using a limited rating ballot, it is ambiguous as to what the voter's ordinal preference might be: either >, <, or exactly equal =.
Q: How can we better describe what the "dispute" is and the reason for the dispute, if it exists at all?
Filingpro (talk) 17:05, 19 July 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mischaracterization of "dispute" attributed to weighted preference ballots? 

message: cardinal preferences (scale 0 - 100)
Voter X: A:49, B:51, C:100, approves BC (cutoff 50)
Voter Y: A:49, B:51, C:49, approves B (cutoff 50)
B wins
But Y weakly prefers B to C (2 point differential), while X strongly prefers C to B (49 point differential)
If approval measures strength of preference, why doesn't C win?
Note that Y is more or less indifferent to the options, but X has a strong preference for C.
Filingpro (talk) 19:47, 26 July 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Can we say Approval measures "strength" of preference? 

message: "In the strict sense, where a majority of voters consider one candidate better than all others, Approval voting empowers those voters to elect their favorite candidate, but it does not force them to. Voters in a majority bloc can bullet vote to guarantee their top choice is elected. However, if some of those voters prefer to seek a consensus candidate with broader support, Approval voting allows them to do so."
Doesn't every voting method empower voters to elect the majority candidate or a consensus candidate, having perfect information about other voters?
Why does this comment belong in this section?
I believe the whole point of the failure of the Majority criterion is that Approval voting may do so against the voter's will, not when they have perfect information to vote strategically.
I motion to remove this, but I am open to saying something positive about Approval in another section, or here if it can be clarified what is the intent and purpose here and how it is relevant.
Filingpro (talk) 08:11, 27 July 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Why is the assumption of perfect information and strategic voting mentioned in the section for Approval's failure/passage of Majority? 

message: The article argues that Approval voting passes or fails Majority, depending on the definition of the criterion.
"If "prefer" includes an actual expression of the preference ("giving it a better vote"), then Approval voting satisfies the majority criterion. On the other hand, if "prefer" does not include an actual expression of the preference on the ballot ("don't vote it worse"), then Approval voting fails the criterion as shown by the subsequent example."
There are several problems I see:
(1) It characterizes one side of the debate (I believe the correct side) incorrectly. It says "prefer" does not include an actual expression of the preference on the ballot (for Approval to fail). That is incorrect. It may or may not. Those of us who argue Approval fails the Majority criterion, point out that the definition of the criterion refers to the voter's preferences. The debate over the Approval ballot is a red herring, because the criterion uses a voter ordinal preference model (as conceded by the article itself).
(2) The other problem with the position that we should interpret Majority criterion to be referring to literal markings on an Approval ballot (rather than voter ordinal preferences as the criterion is defined), is that this assumption leads to absurd results that I can not fathom how any editor in the field can ignore. That is, if you take only the markings on the Approval ballot when considering criteria compliance, Approval voting passes every criterion and is the perfect voting system, which it is obviously not. It is obvious that when a majority of voters prefer a particular candidate above all others, Approval does not necessarily elect this candidate, simply because voters in the majority might also approve a compromise candidate. I fear we have made this article far too complicated, based on what seems to me to be logically absurd, indefensible WP:OR.
(3) The rhetorical approach I am also concerned is misleading. The paragraph states Approval passes as long as we "include actual expression of preferences" and it fails if we "do not include actual expression of preferences". The implication is that the way we make Approval fail is to not include actual stuff, but it passes when we include actual stuff. The truth: Approval passes only when we do not include voter preferences. It fails when we include voter preferences. Ironically, it is the Approval voting system itself that fails to include the articulation of voters actual preferences. Adding to irony, it is claimed that the limited ratings (0, 1) are "actual preferences." Of whom? For Approval to pass, requires the removal of (i.e. do not "include") the voter from the mathematical model.
Filingpro (talk) 10:09, 27 July 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  What is the basis for the definition of Majority under which Approval passes? 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified one external link on Majority criterion. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110228061650/http://www.fairvote.org/single-winner-voting-method-comparison-chart to http://www.fairvote.org/single-winner-voting-method-comparison-chart
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 16:17, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified