Full direct democracy is a bad idea because it’s incredibly inefficient (and thus also boring/annoying, and also subject to manipulation by people willing to exploit others’ boredom/annoyance). This has little or nothing to do with whether people’s preferences correlate with their utilities, which is the question I was focused on. In essence, this isn’t a true Goldilocks situation (“you want just the right amount of heat”) but rather a simple tradeoff (“you want good decisions, but don’t want to spend all your time making them”).
As to the other related concepts… I think this is getting a bit off-topic. The question is, is energy (money) spent on pursuing better voting systems more of a valid “saving throw” than when spent on pursuing better individual rationality. That’s connected to the question of the preference/utility correlation of current-day, imperfectly-rational voters. I’m not seeing the connection to rule of law &c.
Full direct democracy is a bad idea because it’s incredibly inefficient
No, I don’t think so. It is a bad idea even in a society technologically advanced to make it efficient and even if it’s invoked not frequently enough to make it annoying.
whether people’s preferences correlate with their utilities
People’s preferences are many, multidimensional, internally inconsistent, and dynamic. I am not quite sure what do you want to correlate to a single numerical value of “utility”.
The question is, is energy (money) spent on pursuing better voting systems more of a valid “saving throw” than when spent on pursuing better individual rationality.
Why are you considering only these two options?
I’m not seeing the connection to rule of law &c.
The connection is that what is a “better” voting system depends on the context, context that includes things like rule of law, etc.
You’re raising some valid questions, but I can’t respond to all of them. Or rather, I could respond (granting some of your arguments, refining some, and disputing some), but I don’t know if it’s worth it. Do you have an underlying point to make, or are you just looking for quibbles? If it’s the latter, I still thank you for responding (it’s always gratifying to see people care about issues that I think are important, even if they disagree); but I think I’ll disengage, because I expect that whatever response I give would have its own blemishes for you to find.
Full direct democracy is a bad idea because it’s incredibly inefficient (and thus also boring/annoying, and also subject to manipulation by people willing to exploit others’ boredom/annoyance). This has little or nothing to do with whether people’s preferences correlate with their utilities, which is the question I was focused on. In essence, this isn’t a true Goldilocks situation (“you want just the right amount of heat”) but rather a simple tradeoff (“you want good decisions, but don’t want to spend all your time making them”).
As to the other related concepts… I think this is getting a bit off-topic. The question is, is energy (money) spent on pursuing better voting systems more of a valid “saving throw” than when spent on pursuing better individual rationality. That’s connected to the question of the preference/utility correlation of current-day, imperfectly-rational voters. I’m not seeing the connection to rule of law &c.
No, I don’t think so. It is a bad idea even in a society technologically advanced to make it efficient and even if it’s invoked not frequently enough to make it annoying.
People’s preferences are many, multidimensional, internally inconsistent, and dynamic. I am not quite sure what do you want to correlate to a single numerical value of “utility”.
Why are you considering only these two options?
The connection is that what is a “better” voting system depends on the context, context that includes things like rule of law, etc.
You’re raising some valid questions, but I can’t respond to all of them. Or rather, I could respond (granting some of your arguments, refining some, and disputing some), but I don’t know if it’s worth it. Do you have an underlying point to make, or are you just looking for quibbles? If it’s the latter, I still thank you for responding (it’s always gratifying to see people care about issues that I think are important, even if they disagree); but I think I’ll disengage, because I expect that whatever response I give would have its own blemishes for you to find.
In other words: OK, so what?
Some people find blemish-finding services valuable, some don’t :-)
Fair enough. Thanks. Again, I agree with some of your points. I like blemish-picking as long as it doesn’t require open-ended back-and-forth.