If we know which of these makes a bigger difference, it will be clear whether or not we should vote for a third party.
Will it? If my vote has X influence on the election if I vote for a nincompoop, and Y influence on party platforms if I vote for a third party, what relationship between X and Y makes it clear that I should vote for a nincompoop?
X > Y
I suppose the problem is defining influence.
I suppose it would be something like the probability of a change times the magnitude of the change times the number of bits of control you have over the direction.
If you vote for a main party candidate, you only have one bit of control over the direction. If you vote for any of eight parties, you have three bits.
If consider influencing the candidates for the next election, you have a high probability of a low magnitude change. If consider deciding the winner for this election, you have a low probability of a high magnitude change.
Today's post, Stop Voting For Nincompoops was originally published on 02 January 2008. A summary (taken from the LW wiki):
Discuss the post here (rather than in the comments to the original post).
This post is part of the Rerunning the Sequences series, where we'll be going through Eliezer Yudkowsky's old posts in order so that people who are interested can (re-)read and discuss them. The previous post was The American System and Misleading Labels, and you can use the sequence_reruns tag or rss feed to follow the rest of the series.
Sequence reruns are a community-driven effort. You can participate by re-reading the sequence post, discussing it here, posting the next day's sequence reruns post, or summarizing forthcoming articles on the wiki. Go here for more details, or to have meta discussions about the Rerunning the Sequences series.