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Path: utzoo!watmath!watnot!watdcsu!herbie
From: herbie@watdcsu.UUCP (Herb Chong [DCS])
Newsgroups: net.auto
Subject: Re: Seat belts (please move exclusively to net.auto)
Message-ID: <1356@watdcsu.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 7-May-85 21:16:23 EDT
Article-I.D.: watdcsu.1356
Posted: Tue May  7 21:16:23 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 8-May-85 05:27:15 EDT
References: <317@rtech.ARPA> <1560043@acf4.UUCP>
Reply-To: herbie@watdcsu.UUCP (Herb Chong [DCS])
Organization: U of Waterloo
Lines: 50
Summary: 

In article <1560043@acf4.UUCP> mms1646@acf4.UUCP (Michael M. Sykora) writes:
>
>>herbie@watdcsu.UUCP (Herb Chong [DCS]) /  9:56 am  May  1, 1985 */
>
>>a few years back, the Mathematical Games column of Scientific American
>>did a little game theory analysis of the system of plain majority votes
>>in decisions.  i forget the date, but in essence, it concluded that
>>majority votes were fine if you were one of the majority, but poorly
>>represented any minorities.  
>>
>>Herb Chong...
>
>Why in the world did this require "game theory analysis?"
why not?  it's a standing joke in our department that game theory
was a mathematical way of predicting what already happened.

seriously though, it points to something that is assumed within a
voting society: the decision of the majority represents an acceptible
action to everyone.  one example where this fails is in the laws of the
land.  if i managed to convince enough people that all cars had to have
four wheels or they were illegal and got it passed as a law, then
people with 3 wheeled cars would be out of luck.  whether it makes any
sense to pass such a law is another question.  you may think this
silly, but then what of the laws that used to restrict blacks to
certain parts of cities?  what of laws that used to restrict the number
of my ancestors (chinese) from entering the country?  they weren't
passed until after there were many people of chinese extraction
entering the country and the white, majority population, felt they were
threatened.  the law was eventually overturned, but not for years.

another assumption of the system is that all voters are able to
understand the issue and make an intelligent decision based upon that
understanding.  this is an ASSUMPTION.  whether it is true or not only
hindsight can tell.  the seatbelt laws are passed by people who we
placed in charge who have the knowledge or have the common sense to listen
to people who know more than they do about a technical area.  there are
many, many studies that have shown the benefits of seat-belt laws in 
reducing the total number of serious accidents.  yes, it's an infringement
of personal freedom to be told you have to by government, but then it's
probably just a serious to be spanked by your father (or mother) for doing
something they told you not to do.  have you sued your parents lately?

Herb Chong...

I'm user-friendly -- I don't byte, I nybble....

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