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02672: Re: [WDDM] Democracy axioms

From: Joshua N Pritikin <jpritikin(at)pobox.com>
Date: Fri, 13 Aug 2010 17:43:25 -0700
Subject: Re: [WDDM] Democracy axioms

On Fri, Aug 13, 2010 at 06:57:44PM -0500, Joshua Petersen wrote:
My knowledge of this comes more from classes in how mass media (which
covered how to manipulate polls).

Sure.

Here's a readable book on the topic:

Moore, David. (2008). The opinion makers: An insider exposes the truth
behind the polls. Beacon Press.

Unfortunately, I have no statistics for that portion, I'm sorry.
Though corruption is obviously a thing that isn't documented as much
as it should be, so getting worthwhile statistics on such a topic
would be tricky.

That's not what I meant. In fact, your whole reply misses the point.

I am not saying that we should disallow self-selected opinion polls.
Signature petitions are self-selected opinion polls. I am saying that,
in addition to signature petitions, we should allow qualification by
scientific public opinion poll.

That's how come the self-selected polls would work better.

Fine. Let them work better, if you think so. I am just saying that a
scientific public opinion poll would be a nice option to have for
qualification.

Should Sally May's pet cat get a street named after her?
Should we declare war on a 3rd world communist country that just declared it
was going to develop nuclear arsenal?

Both questions are wrong. It should be something like:

+ "Shall we qualify an initiative to decide whether Sally May's pet cat
get a street named after her?"

+ "Shall we qualify an initiative to decide whether to declare war on a
3rd world communist country that just declared it was going to develop
nuclear arsenal?"

Granted, the polls do accurately show to some degree how the public
will vote on the topics.

It depends how you word the question. I am talking about doing a poll on
whether to qualify an initiative.

The poll doesn't decide which side will win, again that's the purpose
of the vote itself.

Right

Yes, in traditional normal situations, a random poll is insanely more
reliable than a self-selected poll. However, a government fully by the
people is anything but a traditional normal situation.

I don't follow you.


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