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Attended college thanks to the generous state support of education in 1960's America. Earned a Ph.D. in mathematics at the University of Illinois followed by post doctoral research positions at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. Taught for several years at Lehigh University prior to a short stint at Bell Laboratories but followed by a much longer career at NEC punctuated by ten U.S. and international patents in the general area to semiconductor applications. Now living in a comfortable Maine retirement community and focused on the prospect of upgrading democracy by means of an improved voting system.
OpEd News Member for 956 week(s) and 0 day(s)
137 Articles, 30 Quick Links, 1478 Comments, 12 Diaries, 3 Series, 8 Polls
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Tuesday, October 1, 2024
Another Ranked-Choice Spoiler (Corrected version) This article corrects an error in the previous version. It illustrates the spoiler effect occurrence in a ranked-choice election with only three candidates.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views), Ranked Voting (38 Articles, 48625 views)
Tuesday, October 1, 2024Another Ranked-Choice Spoiler (Corrected version) This article corrects an error in the previous version. It illustrates the spoiler effect occurrence in a ranked-choice election with only three candidates.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views), Ranked Voting (38 Articles, 48625 views)
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Thursday, September 26, 2024
Another Ranked-Choice Spoiler As the title suggests, this article presents an example election that fails due to the spoiler effect. In this case there are only three candidates.
Thursday, September 26, 2024Another Ranked-Choice Spoiler As the title suggests, this article presents an example election that fails due to the spoiler effect. In this case there are only three candidates.
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Monday, August 19, 2024
Handicaps in Score Elections Score voting systems can be praised for allowing expression of both approval and disapproval regarding each candidate. But few score voting systems provide equal opportunities for these choices; some favor famous candidates and others favor the less famous ones. Some allow different levels of power for opposition than for support. Examples are explored in the article.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
Monday, August 19, 2024Handicaps in Score Elections Score voting systems can be praised for allowing expression of both approval and disapproval regarding each candidate. But few score voting systems provide equal opportunities for these choices; some favor famous candidates and others favor the less famous ones. Some allow different levels of power for opposition than for support. Examples are explored in the article.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
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Friday, August 2, 2024
Similarities Between Star Voting and Balanced Approval Voting Star voting has had some popularity in recent years, apparently because of its good performance in some simulations. Both star voting and BAV are closely related to score voting, but beyond that they have many differences. This article examines those differences and this provides a platform for reviewing the important features of BAV that make it such an attractive voting system.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
Friday, August 2, 2024Similarities Between Star Voting and Balanced Approval Voting Star voting has had some popularity in recent years, apparently because of its good performance in some simulations. Both star voting and BAV are closely related to score voting, but beyond that they have many differences. This article examines those differences and this provides a platform for reviewing the important features of BAV that make it such an attractive voting system.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
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Sunday, June 30, 2024
Runoff in a Star Election This article considers runoff elections in a general way, but particularly focusing on star voting, which is seen to be affected, in an unusual way, by the spoiler effect.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views), Ranked Voting (38 Articles, 48625 views)
Sunday, June 30, 2024Runoff in a Star Election This article considers runoff elections in a general way, but particularly focusing on star voting, which is seen to be affected, in an unusual way, by the spoiler effect.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views), Ranked Voting (38 Articles, 48625 views)
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Wednesday, May 8, 2024
Why Have Laws Against Murder? The article is intended as food for thought. We explore the possibility that the preamble to our Constitution provides us with good guidance about why some laws should be regarded as illegitimate. Various laws are considered as examples, including dietary laws, murder, theft, fraud and abortion.
Wednesday, May 8, 2024Why Have Laws Against Murder? The article is intended as food for thought. We explore the possibility that the preamble to our Constitution provides us with good guidance about why some laws should be regarded as illegitimate. Various laws are considered as examples, including dietary laws, murder, theft, fraud and abortion.
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Monday, April 1, 2024
Should Legislatures Use Balanced Approval Voting? (Hint: They already do) Earlier articles in this series have focused on general election or sometimes primaries. This one looks at how to apply an improved voting system to improve the legislative process, either in Congress or in a state or local legislature.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
Monday, April 1, 2024Should Legislatures Use Balanced Approval Voting? (Hint: They already do) Earlier articles in this series have focused on general election or sometimes primaries. This one looks at how to apply an improved voting system to improve the legislative process, either in Congress or in a state or local legislature.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
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Monday, March 11, 2024
Families of Voting Systems Just because two voting systems use the same ballots does not mean they are the same. How the votes are counted and how the winner is determined are equally important. This article describes such variations of balanced approval voting.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views), Ranked Voting (38 Articles, 48625 views)
Monday, March 11, 2024Families of Voting Systems Just because two voting systems use the same ballots does not mean they are the same. How the votes are counted and how the winner is determined are equally important. This article describes such variations of balanced approval voting.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views), Ranked Voting (38 Articles, 48625 views)
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Sunday, February 25, 2024
Illusions of Ending the Two-Party Duopoly If ending the two-party duopoly is what we want to accomplish then the options for a new voting system seem quite limited.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views), Ranked Voting (38 Articles, 48625 views)
Sunday, February 25, 2024Illusions of Ending the Two-Party Duopoly If ending the two-party duopoly is what we want to accomplish then the options for a new voting system seem quite limited.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views), Ranked Voting (38 Articles, 48625 views)
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Tuesday, February 6, 2024
Can We Reform our Polarized Two-Party Politics? There are many reasons to favor balanced approval voting, and high on the list is that it would give voters more candidates to choose from. This purpose here is to consolidate the most important advantages of this voting system within a single article.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
Tuesday, February 6, 2024Can We Reform our Polarized Two-Party Politics? There are many reasons to favor balanced approval voting, and high on the list is that it would give voters more candidates to choose from. This purpose here is to consolidate the most important advantages of this voting system within a single article.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
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Wednesday, January 10, 2024
Is BAV Compatible with the Electoral College? The Electoral College now seems an anachronism, but it is enshrined in the Constitution and seems very hard to eliminate. This article suggests a couple of ways to improve matters without resorting to eliminating it.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
Wednesday, January 10, 2024Is BAV Compatible with the Electoral College? The Electoral College now seems an anachronism, but it is enshrined in the Constitution and seems very hard to eliminate. This article suggests a couple of ways to improve matters without resorting to eliminating it.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
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Tuesday, January 2, 2024
Top-down Bias in Podcasting Technological changes can cause cultural problems that require us to adapt. It may be impossible to return to what worked in the past and so new solutions may be needed. Polarization and the consequent limitations on civil discussions may in part be a consequence of social media. It seems impossible for us to eliminate social media but here we suggest another way to bring back civil discussions of important issues.
Tuesday, January 2, 2024Top-down Bias in Podcasting Technological changes can cause cultural problems that require us to adapt. It may be impossible to return to what worked in the past and so new solutions may be needed. Polarization and the consequent limitations on civil discussions may in part be a consequence of social media. It seems impossible for us to eliminate social media but here we suggest another way to bring back civil discussions of important issues.
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Thursday, December 28, 2023
Bottom-up Electoral Reform This article is really a plea for help with spreading the word about BAV. There are a few people who support this method of voting but that number is now quite small compared to the number who are completely unaware of it. So long as that is true, it will not even be a candidate for adoption. Changing that will not be easy, but the article proposes a strategy.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
Thursday, December 28, 2023Bottom-up Electoral Reform This article is really a plea for help with spreading the word about BAV. There are a few people who support this method of voting but that number is now quite small compared to the number who are completely unaware of it. So long as that is true, it will not even be a candidate for adoption. Changing that will not be easy, but the article proposes a strategy.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
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Friday, December 15, 2023
Less Democracy Should Not Be an Option A podcast discusses the wisdom of returning to smoke-filled rooms (well, maybe no cigars) to decide on nominations for our leaders. Here we argue that there are better alternatives.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
Friday, December 15, 2023Less Democracy Should Not Be an Option A podcast discusses the wisdom of returning to smoke-filled rooms (well, maybe no cigars) to decide on nominations for our leaders. Here we argue that there are better alternatives.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
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Thursday, November 30, 2023
Do IRV Voters Just Need Training? Revised to fix tables: A second example is presented of an IRV election being subjected to the spoiler effect. This second example does not depend on the odd handling of abstentions in IRV elections.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views), Ranked Voting (38 Articles, 48625 views)
Thursday, November 30, 2023Do IRV Voters Just Need Training? Revised to fix tables: A second example is presented of an IRV election being subjected to the spoiler effect. This second example does not depend on the odd handling of abstentions in IRV elections.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views), Ranked Voting (38 Articles, 48625 views)
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Sunday, November 5, 2023
Spoiled Again The major selling point for ranked-choice voting has always been that it avoids the spoiler effect. This is shown by example. Here we show a different example of a ranked-choice election in which the spoiler effect does happen.
Series: Ranked Voting (38 Articles, 48625 views), Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
Sunday, November 5, 2023Spoiled Again The major selling point for ranked-choice voting has always been that it avoids the spoiler effect. This is shown by example. Here we show a different example of a ranked-choice election in which the spoiler effect does happen.
Series: Ranked Voting (38 Articles, 48625 views), Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
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Thursday, October 19, 2023
Good Strategic Voting IRV is such a complex voting system it might seem that strategic voting simply could not happen. But this article shows that it could become a concern.
Series: Ranked Voting (38 Articles, 48625 views), Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
Thursday, October 19, 2023Good Strategic Voting IRV is such a complex voting system it might seem that strategic voting simply could not happen. But this article shows that it could become a concern.
Series: Ranked Voting (38 Articles, 48625 views), Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
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Wednesday, September 27, 2023
Comparing BAV with Ranked Choice Voting Compared to BAV, ranked-choice voting asks much more of voters. And it puts much more effort into evaluating the responses, so it is not unreasonable to ponder whether all that extra effort is justified.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views), Ranked Voting (38 Articles, 48625 views)
Wednesday, September 27, 2023Comparing BAV with Ranked Choice Voting Compared to BAV, ranked-choice voting asks much more of voters. And it puts much more effort into evaluating the responses, so it is not unreasonable to ponder whether all that extra effort is justified.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views), Ranked Voting (38 Articles, 48625 views)
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Sunday, September 3, 2023
How Did Trump Ever Win? Trump owes his nomination in 2016 to plurality voting. This is not news to anyone who has followed this series of articles, but it is a message that is worth repeating. The real purpose of this article is to gather into one short article the important reasons for favoring balanced approval voting.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
Sunday, September 3, 2023How Did Trump Ever Win? Trump owes his nomination in 2016 to plurality voting. This is not news to anyone who has followed this series of articles, but it is a message that is worth repeating. The real purpose of this article is to gather into one short article the important reasons for favoring balanced approval voting.
Series: Balanced Voting (102 Articles, 133721 views)
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Tuesday, August 29, 2023
Why Bother to Meter Electric Power? Qui Bono? Who profits from charging end customers for electric power usage? It is the producers of power who produce that electric power by burning fossil fuels. So why peruse policies that perpetuate this approach?
Series: Electricity Delivery Charges (4 Articles, 12105 views)
Tuesday, August 29, 2023Why Bother to Meter Electric Power? Qui Bono? Who profits from charging end customers for electric power usage? It is the producers of power who produce that electric power by burning fossil fuels. So why peruse policies that perpetuate this approach?
Series: Electricity Delivery Charges (4 Articles, 12105 views)
