ONT Gathering Questions
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FF = Frank Farance
JS = John Sowa
JS: I like what seems to be to be a sound basis for an emering consensus:
the suggestions by Matthew West, as extended by Tim King and further
supported and clarified by Jon Awbrey.
JS: Following is Tim's extension to Matthew's suggestion:
JS: Voting options =
Yes, No, Abstain (no opinion), Abstain (not participating)
JS: Active members (registered to continue membership) =
Yes + No + Abstain (no opinion) + Abstain (not participating)
JS: Voters = Yes + No + Abstain (no opinion)
JS: Majority: Yes / Voters > y%
FF: The lines above are the nature of the problem.
I agree with Jon Awbrey's statment: (paraphrase)
"an abstain is neither pro nor con" ... the purpose
of registering an abstain is to neither support nor
oppose a motion/ballot. With the above rules, voting
"Abstain (no opinion)" has the same effect as a No vote,
thus an Abstain doesn't count has having "no opinion".
No, an abstention does not have the same effect as a no vote.
If the noes had won a plurality, but not a majority, then it
would be equally possible for them to say that the abstains
had counted against them, so the burden is equal and fair
on both sides. But what that burden is, is just the onus
of developing a majority for any position, and the only
thing that counts against either side is the inability
to achieve just that.
An explicit abstention does not count for or against the issue,
but it does count toward the overall validity of the vote, much
in the same way that the sample size N counts toward the validity
of an experiment or survey, and anyone who later argues for the
validity of the vote will use it in just this way, to say that
a total of N persons participated in the vote (or survey or
experiment). If N is very small, critics will have good
reason to dismiss the significance of the vote (etc.),
no matter what the outcome. To use the participation
of the abstainers toward the validity of the vote
without giving due consideration to their doubts
is a form of exploitation, pure and simple.
Jon Awbrey
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