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0 pointsgodelski3y ago0 comments

What's the added complexity of STAR?

STAR is phase 1: sort(sum(candidates))[:2] (almost identical to score/approval/FPTP. We'd just take argmax instead of top two) and phase 2: eliminate other candidates, argmax(sum(candidates)) (identical to score/approval/FPTP).

On the other hand RCV is a multi-round system with a while loop. In practice it almost never has fewer than 2 rounds (requires overwhelming majority, which almost never happens with more than 3 candidates).

From an algorithms perspective RCV is more complex.

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5 comments · 2 top-level

Wowfunhappy3y ago· 2 in thread

> From an algorithms perspective RCV is more complex.

Perhaps, but people aren't computers.

It's admittedly difficult to score this objectively, but I find RCV much easier to understand.

godelskiOP3y ago

Much easier to understand from the voter perspective of the tallier perspective? From the voter perspective I find them fairly equivalent and both are frequently used in the everyday world (scoring might be even more considering 5 star reviews). But from a tallying perspective I think it is very hard to argue that RCV is substantially easier. Again, the score/approval algorithm is identical to the FPTP algorithm (which is trivial). It is simply argmax(sum(candidates)). Just sum the totals in an excel file and pick the largest number. I don't know a single person that has a hard time understanding this and I suspect if they did they would have an even harder time understanding how to tally RCV.

Wowfunhappy3y ago

With STAR, it's harder to understand the affect of your vote.

RCV means: "I'd like this candidate, but if he can't win, I'll take this candidate instead." (And so on down the list of candidates.) Most people understand the concept of runoff elections. And, it's very very obvious that adding second and third choice candidates will never make your first choice less likely to win (on your individual ballot).

Under STAR, the effect of your ratings are less clear.

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garaetjjte3y ago· 1 in thread

I mean the added complexity of STAR compared to score. It irks me that it basically adds second election using different system, that happens to sneakily reuse the same ballot.

godelskiOP3y ago

It's not a different system, it's the exact same algorithm. In both rounds it is argmax(sum(candidates)) (identical to FPTP btw) but the first round you take two elements instead of 1 and second round you use one hot vectors restricted to the top 2. That's it.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

0 comments

5 comments · 2 top-level

Wowfunhappy3y ago· 2 in thread

> From an algorithms perspective RCV is more complex.

Perhaps, but people aren't computers.

It's admittedly difficult to score this objectively, but I find RCV much easier to understand.

godelskiOP3y ago

Wowfunhappy3y ago

With STAR, it's harder to understand the affect of your vote.

Under STAR, the effect of your ratings are less clear.

1 more reply

garaetjjte3y ago· 1 in thread

I mean the added complexity of STAR compared to score. It irks me that it basically adds second election using different system, that happens to sneakily reuse the same ballot.

godelskiOP3y ago

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse