tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6590358285673767171.post5754315883073002451..comments2023-05-28T17:47:26.943-07:00Comments on A Nice Place To Live: Small Symbolic ContributionsAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08064363064872625529noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6590358285673767171.post-5185125514820933852014-01-23T08:06:52.405-08:002014-01-23T08:06:52.405-08:00Yeah, decision theory can help motivate voting mor...Yeah, decision theory can help motivate voting more strongly than just an expected-value argument, but even a pure CDTer should find it cost-effective ex ante.<br /><br />I agree that all these are cases where someone who doesn't care about small probabilities would be not very motivated.Brian Tomasikhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10510289096715716609noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6590358285673767171.post-20530475665348809282014-01-20T11:10:46.102-08:002014-01-20T11:10:46.102-08:00Hmm.. You're probably right that it's clea...Hmm.. You're probably right that it's clearly better for the Democrats to win near-term elections.<br /><br />In my post, I'm not so much focusing on the "not cost-effective" part as I am on the "everybody plays a tiny role in a major decision-making process" part. I guess if we're thinking in probabilities and expected utility, your own vote (or act of recycling or vegetarianism) DOES accomplish something tangible. But if we're thinking in terms of how the world will be different whether we vote or not, well, it will be pretty much identical because it's extremely unlikely that any particular vote will decide the outcome.<br /><br />Before the election, my vote seems to have high expected utility.<br />After the election, my vote seems to have not swayed anything.<br />Could that be a EDT vs CDT thing? Or a case of taking pride in objectivity vs taking pride in being right?Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08064363064872625529noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6590358285673767171.post-36637690621644154642014-01-19T21:12:04.649-08:002014-01-19T21:12:04.649-08:00The Iraq war was one small example out of many, ma...The Iraq war was one small example out of many, many cases where Democrats would be better than Republicans for the future of the light cone. Not just on dollars but also on social values, flow-through effects, and all the rest. Adding all those factors together gets a pretty big impact.<br /><br />We may have different views about which party is better on which issues?<br /><br />In the case of only two options, you'll have one that's worse than average and one that's better than average. There can be offsetting factors pushing both toward zero, but it still seems empirically to me that the difference between the two major parties is big enough that voting becomes pretty cost-effective.Brian Tomasikhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10510289096715716609noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6590358285673767171.post-42431550934690313232014-01-19T09:14:05.968-08:002014-01-19T09:14:05.968-08:00Sure, but people are never really placed in that s...Sure, but people are never really placed in that situation because of flow-through effects, counterfactual costs, and uncertainty over whether parties will stay true to their advertised values and policies. I'm also not sure we can measure political progress in dollars when so much of progress has to do with social change, wellbeing, health, etc. I'm also not sure to what extent politics is an actual driver of change in non-crisis situations. Like you argue for charities, I don't think one political party is usually many orders of magnitude better than those it runs against.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08064363064872625529noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6590358285673767171.post-21498767773608360612014-01-18T07:27:19.943-08:002014-01-18T07:27:19.943-08:00Say the only issue on which the parties differed w...Say the only issue on which the parties differed was international aid, with the Democrats giving $1 billion more than the Republicans. Then voting Democrat would be worth $100 of government-quality aid (which could be, say, ~$25-75 of donation to a GiveWell top charity). If you mail in the ballot, it can take well less than an hour to vote, so that's a decent return.<br /><br />In practice, the parties differ on many issues at least this important, including foreign policy. There's a decent chance Al Gore wouldn't have invaded Iraq and cost $2 trillion, plus huge costs to the US's international reputation and friendliness. $2 trillion times 1 in 10 million is $200K per vote. :) Of course, these savings are not nearly as useful as if you had total discretion on how to spend them, but it's still a huge deal.Brian Tomasikhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10510289096715716609noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6590358285673767171.post-7509680945751404302014-01-17T15:21:10.192-08:002014-01-17T15:21:10.192-08:00I call them "symbolic" in the sense that...I call them "symbolic" in the sense that each individual instance has very low expected utility. The study Shulman cites says that even in the most competitive states, your vote has about a 1 in 10 million chance of determining the outcome. Then consider that the political differences between the two parties are often much smaller than advertised.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08064363064872625529noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6590358285673767171.post-51356678957966478722014-01-16T20:59:52.324-08:002014-01-16T20:59:52.324-08:00I don't think any of these is purely or even p...I don't think any of these is purely or even primarily symbolic (although, especially if you're a popular person, the symbolic spillover value might dwarf the direct value). See "<a href="http://www.utilitarian-essays.com/vegetarianism.html" rel="nofollow">Does Vegetarianism Make a Difference?</a>," and the same argument applies for recycling. As for voting, here's a quote from "<a href="http://lesswrong.com/lw/2ur/probability_and_politics/" rel="nofollow">Probability and Politics</a>":<br /><br />"Last time I estimated a cost of $50 to $500 per vote from contributions, more in more competitive races (diminishing returns). So unless you have a high opportunity cost, you'd do better to vote yourself than contribute to a campaign in your own jurisdiction. The standard heuristic that everyone should vote seems to have been defended.<br />But let's avoid motivated stopping. The above data indicate frequent differences of 1-2 orders of magnitude across jurisdictions. So someone in an uncompetitive New York district would often do better to donate less than $50 (to a competitive race) than to vote. (On the other hand, if you live in a competitive district [4], replacing your vote with donations might cost a sizable portion of your charitable budget.)"Brian Tomasikhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10510289096715716609noreply@blogger.com