British hackers: stop voting for lizards; start voting for people today

http://reprog.wordpress.com/2011/05/05/stop-voting-for-lizards-start-voting-for-people/

by MikeTaylor • 15 years ago

199 100 15 years ago

reprog.wordpress.com

udp• 15 years ago

I still don't understand why the referendum is on AV and not PR. Most votes get thrown away because of this silly county-based system. If you live in a county which is heavily weighted towards a particular party, you do not have a meaningful vote.

MikeTaylor8• 15 years ago

udp, some people prefer PR over AV (for the record, I prefer AV because it keeps the one-representative-per-constituency link), but since PR is not on the table, voting for AV is the way to go. (Or voting to keep British politics the way it is, of course.)

ugh• 15 years ago

Just for the record, it is possible to force one-or-more-representatives-per-constituency on PR.

Germany, for example, has a (pretty complicated) voting system that insures that every constituency has one representative (that's half of the parliament, the other half has, technically speaking, no constituency but they are obviously still from somewhere).

Everyone gets two votes, one for a representative from the constituency (whoever gets the most votes wins and will definitely be in parliament), and, more importantly, a second vote which determines the proportions of the parties in parliament. (Seats that parties cannot fill with directly elected representatives are filled from the party list.)

That second vote decides about the government (proportionally!), the first makes sure that every constituency has someone in parliament they can write letters.

This voting system is called mixed member proportional representation and here is the link to its Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed_member_proportional_repre...

vidarh• 15 years ago

The "one-representative-per-constituency" link doesn't mean much to those of us who end up getting "represented" by a parliament where none of the elected MP's have views remotely like our own because our views are uncommon enough in every constituency. That's what gets me about this debate: Ultimately it is about whether or not you keep disenfranchising those who do not agree with the larger parties.

AV will help somewhat in the long term, as people are more free to vote for the smaller parties without quite the same risk of losing seats for the lesser evil of the large parties, but it will still leave a substantial number of people without any meaningful representation.

I'm originally from Norway, and I much prefer the Norwegian system: PR with multi-seat constituencies where each constituency is a reasonably small geographical region, combined with a small number of seats that are allocated in order to more closely approximate the countrywide vote totals amongst the parties that got more than 4% of the vote (personally I think the 4% limit ought to go too).

It maintains a regional link, while at the same time getting a far more accurate representation of how people vote.

I support AV over FPTP because it will force the larger parties to be somewhat more mindful of other voters and because it may allow some opposition parties to grow faster because of less tactical voting, but whatever the result, I will still be without anyone representing my interests.

r70002• 15 years ago

A PR system maintaining one representative per constituency is already in use in the United Kingdom - in both Scotland and Wales.

dazzawazza2• 15 years ago

The Liberal Democrats want (for the most part) PR. There was no way the Conservatives would agree to that in the coalition agreement so this was as good as you they could get.

As the press would say "it's a dirty coalition compromise" which you can read as "it's a pragmatic decision based on the political landscape of the day taking in to account the moral perspective of all involved acting as elected officials"

GeneralWaste• 15 years ago

Some in the UK hold the opinion that the Liberal Democrats capitulated too easily to the Conservatives during the negotiation process that led to the formation of our current government. Whilst they only have a relatively small number of MPs they still hold the balance of power and could perhaps have held out for PR. Their apparent willingness to compromise this and other principles of their party in exchange for a share of power has led to a plummet in their popularity. Their leader has been spat at in the street and had dog poo through his letterbox.

mdasen• 15 years ago

In Ireland (both Ireland and Northern Ireland), voting is done by Single Transferable Vote (STV). It's an interesting system that gets closer to proportional representation while still meaning that you're voting for candidates. Basically, you have multi-seat constituencies. So, you live in Place X and there are, say, 12 people running for 3 positions. You rank the candidates in order of your preference (like AV). Then you have a point that the candidates have to pass - the number of votes divided by the number of seats + 1 (#votes/(seats in constituency + 1); hope that disambiguates my language). Votes get redistributed somewhat like AV. It's a tad hard for me to explain since it seems a bit intuitively obvious to me. Wikipedia has an example that does a decent job: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_transferable_vote#An_exa.... As you see, excess votes get redistributed from candidates who got past the quota without any transfers to the second choice candidates (in proportion to the second choices of people who voted that person as their first choice). Then you see if anyone has reached the quota and if one or more have, any excess votes they received are distributed to their next highest choice; if no one has then the person with the least votes is eliminated and their votes are redistributed and you continue on.

It doesn't exactly get you proportional representation, but it gets closer than AV or FPTP while still allowing you to vote for individual people rather than party lists and it allows you to legitimately have representatives for your region while maintaining decent proportionality. I really think it's a nice system. I like the idea of having regional representation - so that you have your (Congresspeople|TDs|MPs). I like the idea of being able to vote for minority parties. I like the idea of those minority parties being able to get close to proportional representation. STV seems like a nice compromise there. You get to have your representatives for your area bringing local views, you get to vote for people, and you get closer to proportional representation than AV and FPTP.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_transferable_vote

revorad• 15 years ago

Voted. It only took 5 minutes; there's no excuse not to.

petercooper7• 15 years ago

There is. If you can't decide one way or the other. Which is why I've not voted on the issue today. (Though if there were an "abstain" or "unsure" box, I'd have voted for that.)

hnhg2• 15 years ago

A spoiled vote is the traditional way of expressing that.

josephShmoe• 15 years ago

AV, or IRV (Instant Runoff Voting), is arguably the worst form of preferential voting in existence. Take this example of IRV totals for four candidates ordered by preference:

30% a; b; c; d

35% c; b; d; a

20% d; b; a; c

15% b; d; c; a

Given the voting breakdown, most people would agree that candidate b should win, because no candidate got a majority of first preference votes and b got a sweeping majority of second preference votes. However, under IRV, b is eliminated immediately, because b received the fewest first preference votes.

tr;dr: IRV is terrible, and has a history of being adopted in states and cities in the US only to be abolished not long after, because of the bad electoral outcomes it produces. If you're going to pick a preferential voting system, it ought to be one that at the very least preserves the Condorcet winner; IRV is not that system.

danparsonson• 15 years ago

Unfortunately we haven't been offered a suggestion box, just a choice between AV and FPTP - personally, AV seems like an improvement on FPTP, even if it's not the best possible system overall.

henrikschroder• 15 years ago

Why are those the only choices?

Why not switch to proportional representation instead, using D'Hondt or Saint-Laguë? Or is there such strong support for the current single-winner system in the UK that noone wants to change the base idea?

NickPollard2• 15 years ago

Well if we vote in AV, can we then have an AV referendum next year on voting reform?

"Please rank the following voting systems in order of preference."

jbert• 15 years ago

I don't disagree. But in the spirit of "the perfect is the enemy of the good" if AV/IRV is an improvement over FPTP (which it seems to be) - then is there any downside (in terms of fairness of outcode) to a 'yes' vote in this referendum?

petercooper7• 15 years ago

This is a personal view but I think there is. I think that AV could make the process of voting different/confusing enough for many voters to be turned off of voting or, perhaps, screwing up their ballots. If I agree with only one element of the "No" campaign, it's that enough of the electorate is stupid/ignorant enough to find the change difficult changing the outcome of future elections.

modernerd• 15 years ago

Faced with a decision between:

1. The system that doesn't take alternative preferences into account (FPTP);

2. The system that does (AV),

which would you pick? AV isn't the perfect preferential voting system, but it's our only hope of a transition to any form of preferential voting right now, which opens the door for refinement later instead of closing the debate for another 20 years.

anonymoushn2• 15 years ago

Condorcet is also an undesirable property: http://rangevoting.org/FishburnAntiC.html

randallsquared2• 15 years ago

Condorcet just points out that group preferences are not necessarily consistent. This is a property of group preferences, not merely of some voting systems; the voting systems just allow the inconsistency to be noticed.

jellicle• 15 years ago

IRV is substantially better than FPTP.

The choice today is a FPTP choice: the alternatives are A and B, not some mythical third choice that you just invented. Voters in the UK should vote for the best choice of those available, which is clearly IRV.

Even your statement is simply silly. You're assuming that a voting system ought not eliminate a candidate when he was the least favorite of the voters, and you proceed from there to bash IRV. Big assumption much?

randallsquared2• 15 years ago

In the example given, "a" seems the least favorite, unless you ignore all preferences except the "first choice" preference. However, voting systems that take into account second and third choices (or more) cannot be perfect, since groups do not really have preferences in the same way that individuals do: a group can legitimately prefer every candidate to every other candidate, as Condorcet voting shows.

frobozz3• 15 years ago

An important factor in this electoral system is that you don't have rank all the candidates, just those that you wish to receive your vote. This makes your sample election a trifle unrealistic.

Since everyone voted for everyone in your sample election, everyone would be reasonably happy with the result, regardless of who wins.

protomyth• 15 years ago

So, the simplified version of your example would be each person having two votes that cannot be cast for same person. Top vote getter wins (regardless if it is over 50% or not).

That seems simple enough and easy to explain. Not sure if it would work.

cturner• 15 years ago

Hi Mike. For once some politics on hacker news that has some relevance to me. I'm still flagging.

Voting systems are interesting algorithms to discuss, but politics is not. Please keep political stuff off hn.

MikeTaylor8• 15 years ago

Hi, cturner. The HD guidelines say "Off-Topic: MOST stories about politics" (emphasis added). Votes say that this is one of the ones that is not MOST. Anyway, it'll all be over in less than nine hours, and I'll go back to reviewing programming books from the 1970s and 80s.

estel2• 15 years ago

Nine hours!? I'm stacking up the caffeine for Election Night Special... (Which only has devolved results, but still).

corin_6• 15 years ago

Actually the AV result isn't due until 8pm tomorrow, so more than thirty hours away. Even the first results from AV aren't expected until after 5pm tomorrow.

hugh36• 15 years ago

Votes say that this is one of the ones that is not MOST.

Naah, the "flag" button exists because offtopic stuff does get voted up despite being offtopic. In the case of political stories (some) people tend to vote things up because they agree with the sentiment rather than due to a dispassionate evaluation of the benefits of the article (see also reddit.com/r/politics).

Voting systems are on-topic, but this is obviously political campaigning.

JonnieCache2• 15 years ago

The local office of the Yes campaign is just across the corridor from us. Bigup.

Vote, people. Doesn't matter who/what it's for. Spoil your ballot if you have to. Just make your voice heard.

ZeroGravitas2• 15 years ago

Somewhat strange to be advocating that people should vote for anything, when one of the big issues at stake is a more representative voting system that reduces (but does not eliminate) the chance that your vote will be wasted and have no impact whatsoever.

I've long felt that the popularity of this kind of encouragement to vote, as if it was a civic duty, regardless of how broken the system was, has held back reform of the system.

So vote Yes on AV, vote in scottish elections with partial-PR and feel free not to vote in any election where your vote is not going to count and explain why at great and boring length to anyone who tells you that you have to vote or you have no right to complain etc.

jerf• 15 years ago

Votes are rarely actually "wasted", even in FPTP, and people really need to come to a better understanding of that fact because you get the "smartest" people incorrectly thinking their vote is wasted and thus cutting themselves out of the voting pool.

There is a huge difference between 50.1% A, 49.9% B and 85% A, 15% B. One election produces a politician constantly swinging to the center and watching his back for the next election, the other produces one that acts freely on his beliefs. There is a huge difference between 30% A, 40% B, 30% third-party and 10% A, 89% B, and 1% third-party. One clearly tells the dominant A and B parties that the third-party has tapped into something the voters care deeply about but they've failed to serve, and generally at least one, if not both, of the dominant parties will scramble to serve that demographic. The other says that the vast bulk of people are at least mostly satisfied with the choices (which is all you ever can have). It is this constant scrambling to serve dissatisfied third-party voters that creates the two dominant parties in the first place, not some sort of mega-conspiracy.

Even in FPTP, in an iterated voting situation (which is what we have), third party votes in an otherwise uncontested election aren't wasted, they're probably louder on a per-vote basis than the rest of the horde. If you find yourself nearly alone voting Green/Libertarian/Constitution/whatever, that's because most people are not so dissatisfied that they have to vote third party. You're a fringe vote. (So am I.) But it isn't "wasted".

Please note I am only defending my position that votes are not "wasted" in FPTP. I am not defending the proposition that FPTP is optimal. There may be better systems. Most, if not all, voting systems I know of exhibit the property where a vote is never truly "wasted" in an iterated voting situation, so this argument is neither an attack or defense of FPTP since this is not a unique characteristic of any system.

(It is however only one in a pile, by definition of vote. I do fear some people are ultimately complaining that their vote is wasted precisely because we are voting in the first place and not simply taking their opinion as dictatorial writ. There is a certain fundamental dilution-of-voice that you will experience in any voting scheme; arguably, the "big idea" of democracy is precisely that your voice is at least in theory no louder than any other.)

mseebach• 15 years ago

No. To paraphrase Dijkstra, voting is to democracy as telescopes are to astronomy.

It DOES matter who/what you vote for. And if you don't believe that, why would you believe that doing anything at all with your ballot counts as making your voice heard?

Democracy is about participation. Not campaigning, participation. You need to make your voice heard at all times, not just at elections (frankly, elections are probably the least effective time to make your voice heard). Be informed about the issues, challenge your assumptions and debate your opinions (preferably with people you disagree with). If you can't or won't do those things, you don't live in a democracy, you live in an oligarchy that happens to mutate roughly every decade.

JonnieCache2• 15 years ago

Obviously I don't believe that it doesnt matter who you vote for, what I was trying to say was that I'd rather have someone vote in a way that I disagree with, than not vote at all.

It matters who you vote for, but it doesn't matter to me.

I'm trying to make it clear that I'm not advocating voting in an attempt to advance my own agenda, but rather out of a simple desire for people to make use of their rights as citizens of a democracy.

Notice that I also advocated ballot spoiling as an alternative to casting a vote for any of the choices presented. If you really can't bring yourself to vote for any of the parties, and I certainly wouldn't blame you there, at least go down to the polling station and write "YOU ARE ALL BASTARDS" across the ballot in your own blood or something. That way, you still show up in the turnout figures, avoiding the false impression of voter apathy.

And yes, I definitely agree that voting is probably the least important part of democratic participation, although a lot of the other parts are becoming increasingly frustrated around here...

corin_6• 15 years ago

(I voted "Yes" at 8am.)

If I didn't have any views on which system is better, I would have been pursuaded to vote Yes by the "Vote No" adverts, such as http://i.imgur.com/yCyLv.jpg

Admitedly, the campaign for "Vote Yes" has frankly been terrible as well, but in a way that makes you think they don't have a clue about marketing, rather than a way that makes you want to strangle whoever came up with the adverts.

bhickey• 15 years ago

This morning I ran into a No campaigner leafleting at Camden Tube station. When he tried handing me a leaflet, I informed him that I had just voted Yes.

As I walked away, he shouted that I must be "LibDem scum".

corin_6• 15 years ago

To give him at least some credit, that's a pretty good insult now days!

That actually comes as a bit of a suprise to me, in my head (and in my limited experiences), the kind of person who volunteers to promote a political campaign in the UK isn't normally the type of person who would get particularly aggressive. Admitedly my personal experiences are based in a fairly middle class area of Oxford, so perhaps not representative.

rossriley• 15 years ago

I think the yes campaign must go down as one of the worst I've ever seen. The big budget media campaign was based around the 'Make Your MP Work Harder' campaign.

That's such a vague idea to base a campaign around, especially in light of the attack tactics the No campaign were using.

afterburner2• 15 years ago

This is typical of Yes campaigns for vote reform in Canada as well (at the provincial level). They tend to be poorly funded, and afraid to tackle it head on out of fear of scaring people away (might be true). And the No campaigns tend to be pure fearmongering and misdirection, but well funded. There are sometimes allegations that the Yes campaigns are sabotaged by No supporters working for the Yes campaign (rumour level allegation).

hugh36• 15 years ago

I would have been pursuaded to vote Yes by the "Vote No" adverts, such as http://i.imgur.com/yCyLv.jpg*

That's a pretty dumb ad. I was indeed wondering what the best argument of the "No" campaign would be, and if that's it then that's not much of a campaign.

Still, I gotta wonder -- have they really* budgeted two hundred and fifty million pounds for a new voting system, or is this a made-up number? Because where the hell does that money go?

corin_6• 15 years ago

Rather than wording myself, here's a quote from the BBC's FAQ:

"The No campaign has said the poll will cost about £90m to stage and that an extra £156m will be incurred in switching to AV. The Yes campaign has accused its rivals of "lies", saying the claims are largely based on the alleged cost of introducing electronic counting machines and that these are not required for AV elections. The government has said holding the referendum on the same day as other elections around the UK will save about £17m."

nl2• 15 years ago

Speaking as an Australian (we have preferential voting): Almost anything is better than first past the post.

hugh36• 15 years ago

I can't understand why they bother with this one-alternative thing though. If you're gonna mark two preferences, why not mark 'em all?

McP• 15 years ago

You can mark as many preferences as you like. Alternative Vote is a misnomer, it's known as Instant Runoff Vote elsewhere, which better describes how it works.

tezza• 15 years ago

I am dual Oz / British. I grew up under AV in NSW, with Senate being full PR.

I voted NO because FPTP seems good enough. I don't miss Australia's monster ballot papers. Most of the theoretical advantages of AV , PR dont happen in practice.

I was in Wentworth an unshakeably Liberal seat, whatever your preference. down the road was Maroubra, unshakeable for Labor.

Who can forget the nightmare concessions all the time that Brian Harradine from TAS used to get because he had Balance of Power in the Senate under PR??

nl2• 15 years ago

Yes, there will always be safe seats - I think any system where Wentworth wasn't liberal would be suspect.

Your vote is still important in the Senate (as Harradine showed). I'm from South Australia, and we have a independent senator and it's worked out much better than just having senators from the major parties. It means they end up representing the state instead of just voting on party lines.

Yeah, some of the concessions are annoying (especially with Harradine), but in a way that is more democratic than the normal vote-down-party-lines system.

gjm11• 15 years ago

Recommended online reading:

Some high-quality discussion of this from Tim Gowers (mathematician, Fields Medal winner, very smart chap): http://gowers.wordpress.com/2011/04/20/is-av-better-than-fpt... http://gowers.wordpress.com/2011/04/29/av-vs-fptp-a-suppleme... http://gowers.wordpress.com/2011/04/30/av-vs-fptp-the-shorte... (if you're only going to read one -- and I wouldn't blame you, because they're very long -- read the last one).

Some nice graphics illustrating some pathologies with AV: http://zesty.ca/voting/sim/ (note: http://zesty.ca/ is full of interesting things).

Anti-AV material by an advocate of range voting (note: he dislikes plurality voting, aka first-past-the-post, even more): http://rangevoting.org/IrvPathologySurvey.html

JoeAltmaier3• 15 years ago

Lots of assumtions I didn't quite grasp. What is the distribution of voters? Some uniform space? The voters are rarely distributed that way. So I don't know what I learn from those graphics.

sp3322• 15 years ago

Each point in the image corresponds to an election with the center of opinion located at that point. For every point, we simulate an entire election by scattering 200000 voters in a normal distribution around that point and collecting ballots from all of the voters; then we colour the point to indicate the winner.

seabee5• 15 years ago

It's described under the 'simulation method' heading. Unless you have a reason to suggest otherwise, it's reasonable to assume voters' preferences follow a normal distribution.

petercooper7• 15 years ago

if you care about democracy at all — then get out and vote YES TO AV.

Get a grip. If one cares about democracy "at all" then they need to go out and vote Yes to one extremely narrow option that's only, arguably, mildly better than the status quo? This is nothing more than an appeal to emotion.

MikeTaylor8• 15 years ago

You misrepresented the call to vote here by trimming the quote down too far. What the original article says is:

"Please: if you’ve ever complained about how our politicians don’t represent us and the people who do represent us can’t get elected; if you’re sick of having to choose between two lizards; if you care about democracy at all — then get out and vote YES TO AV."

So I did make an actual case, rather than just appealing to emotion.

petercooper7• 15 years ago

You made a case but wrapped it up with an appeal to which way someone should vote.

Sheepishly voting Yes because someone suggested they might not care about democracy otherwise is not very democratic. If someone cares about democracy, all they need to do is vote full-stop.

Isofarro• 15 years ago

I can't remember the last time the UK had a referendum about voting reform, and based on that it's quite tough to figure out when the next one will be if the winning result is "No".

A clear "No to AV" may be interpreted that no voting reform is needed.

corin_6• 15 years ago

There has never been a referendum about voting reform before in the UK (in fact, the only single previous referendum that was nation-wide was more than 35 years ago, and was related to our membership in the EEC).

NickPollard2• 15 years ago

Mildy better than the status quo is still better than the status quo. Don't fall into the trap of the Status Quo fallacy; vote for your preference about the two options you are given, don't abstain just because you're waiting for the 'perfect' option (hint: it doesn't exist).

arethuza3• 15 years ago

I'm slightly disappointed that the title isn't a reference to the theories of David Icke.

Pahalial• 15 years ago

All shortcomings of AV aside, as a Canadian who just watched a majority get in thanks to a combined 6,021 votes in some dozen marginal ridings, let me just say that I'm jealous of this referendum and I wish you the best.

_b8r0• 15 years ago

I can't stand the Yes campaign. I really, really can't. The smug superiority of it all, the assumption that if you vote no you must be mentally ill and the inability to even debate. To be fair I've had a lot of exposure to people involved in the Yes campaign. I'm not someone who likes being patronised by a hive mind and that's exactly how the Yes campaign comes across.

On the logic of the campaign, giving the options available one should vote Yes, weighing everything up. However it will make no difference to me as my constituency is a safe tory seat, even with all the simulations.

Bear in mind that Nick Clegg opposed AV in the run up to the elections and was pushing for PR and you begin to see what this is. This isn't genuine electoral reform, this is tinkering around the edges. Whatever you vote for this is all you get. You're not pushing further towards a fairer system, you're choosing between two options laid out for you by people who've run the numbers and decided for you. Regardless of the outcome, all the politicians will say, "Well it's settled, the people have spoken", pat each other on the back and go back to their day jobs.

We haven't had a referendum since 1975. We won't get another one on voting for a long time. I'll vote Yes, but only because I know I won't see another chance to change things in my lifetime.

MikeTaylor8• 15 years ago

iuguy, a few things. Most important I really don't believe that "it will make no difference to me as my constituency is a safe tory seat, even with all the simulations." Even if it doesn't change who actually wins, implementing AV can send a clear message to your incumbent by (for example) showing that 25% of the constituents actually want the Green candidate to win (rather than just the 5% who actually voted for her under FPTP, knowing their vote would be wasted). That seems important to me -- it changes the slope of the playing field.

For the same reason, I am not skeptical enough to accept that "this isn't genuine electoral reform, this is tinkering around the edges". AV would make a HUGE difference to me, for the simple reason that it would relieve me of the responsibility to lie when I vote (i.e. claiming that I want the winner to be someone who is actually my second or third choice).

And for those who actually want PR: we are MUCH more likely to get it in our lifetimes if AV wins this referendum than if it loses; in the latter case, the incumbents really will all say "so that's all right then -- everyone likes how we do it now". Which is so very not true that it makes my guts hurt just to type it.

So even if you think AV is only a small step (and for the record I think it's a big one), please vote for it. It is (among other things) a stepping stone to a more comprehensive referendum on voting systems, similar to the one they had in New Zealand -- see http://www.fastchicken.co.nz/2011/05/05/the-uk-gets-to-decid...

British hackers: stop voting for lizards; start voting for people today

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