Voters BTFO'D

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Plato Stanford confirmed for best philosopher of our times.

> The act of voting has an opportunity cost. It takes time and effort that could be used for other valuable things, such as working for pay, volunteering at a soup kitchen, or playing video games.
This is good from first sentence.

>>1483955
They are correct

>The act of voting has an opportunity cost. It takes time and effort that could be used for other valuable things, such as working for pay, volunteering at a soup kitchen, or playing video games.
>valuable
Perhaps one of those is valuable. Hint: the other two are ethical or slavery.

>>1483936
I'm surprised they didn't have an article on this already since this shit has been debated for decades if not centuries.

>perception of vote utility decreases because there are so many voters
>people vote less
>vote utility increases for the voters that remain
All works out in the end.

>voting for representatives

>not voting for policies

Now come the people telling me democracy works because it keeps people from voting.

>>1483936
Why doesn't it talk about voting blocs? Surely blocs composed of a large percentage of the population have a large effect on the outcome, and surely it is in those blocs' rational interest to ensure that as many of its members vote as possible.

>>1485527
Because a group of people can not have a vested interest in anything. There's outcomes from election that would be beneficial to a group, but they don't translate into the decision making process which occurs on an individual level.

>>1485446
However, how many would have to abstain from voting before the utility for a single voter makes it rational? It would be enough to cause some radical change before it reaches that point.

>literally says assassinating political leaders might be a more rational means of enacting social change or combatting injustice than voting

this is the greatest article ever written.

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>>1486766
Well, you can't deny that it can be pretty effective for enacting social changes.

>>1486779
Oh, I agree, I just love votefags getting btfo'd.


>Other major theories offered as solutions to the boundary problem face similar problems. For example, the coercion theory holds that anyone subject to coercion from a political body ought to have a say (López-Guerra 2005). But this principle might be also be seen as over-inclusive (Song 2009), as it would require that resident aliens, tourists, or even enemy combatants be granted a right to vote, as they are also subject to a state’s coercive power
fucking gold

>>1485462
>unironically believing in the system that killed socrates

>>1484162
Playing vidya is slavery?
I kinda agree, I'd just like to hear your reasoning.
My reasoning boils down to "Metal Gear Solid 2 fucked my mind."

>>148679
Being a huge dick is not under scrutiny here, voting is.

>>1486829
You could make the argument that it's deskilling by consumption.

Fascinating stuff. I had never read anything about the philosophy of voting before so my interest is piqued.

As a voter my main criticism of it, however, is that there is a long detailed discussion about how negligible the effects of an individual vote are, which is fair enough to a certain extent, but the claim it takes time and effort to vote that form a significant opportunity cost goes completely unexamined.

When I vote it literally adds approximately two minutes on to my walk to work, so the opportunity cost could be said to be even more negligible than the effect of my vote.

Why do you guys have to do to vote? Fly to the Arctic and fight a Polar Bear?

>>1486892
Once people can vote from their iphones the opportunity cost will be basically nothing.

>>1486892
you have to think a lot about who you want to vote for, unless you're the sort of idiot that just votes for whoever people tell him to or whoever is most entertaining at the moment

>>1486910
electronic voting is too vulnerable to exploitation

>>1486910

Indeed, which would make basically every "anti-voting" argument in the article completely invalid. And make every "pro-voting" argument a knock out winner, no matter how weak.

>>1486919
>you have to think a lot about who you want to vote for,

Good point, but I take an interest in current affairs anyway so if anything that counts as a positive utility since I am indulging in one of my hobbies.

It is an intriguing argument that dumbasses that don't know anything and don't take any interest anyway (without intending that to be an insult to anyone in this thread) shouldn't bother to vote, so I would certainly acknowledge that.

>>1486921
Hardly. There were plenty of arguments in the article besides "voting does too little relative to how much it costs to do it". Hell, even that could still be true, you may be underselling how truly meaningless a vote is.

>>1486934

No.

There are criticisms of the "pro-voting" arguments that focus on the low utility of voting.

There is literally one positive argument for not voting and that is that there is an opportunity cost to the act of voting. And that claim is not examined at all.

If voting has a very low utility but the opportunity cost is insignificant anyway then all of the criticisms made are irrelevant.

>>1486947
>negligible opportunity cost
>negligible gain
This is not what I call a "knock-out win" for pro-voting arguments. No pro-voting argument was substantially correct. What electronic voting would mean is that it just wouldn't matter, vote or not.

Of course, this is pointless, because you'll never be able to vote from your fucking phone. "not voting" has one good argument, and voting has a number of questionable at best arguments.

>>1487047

Negative.

Even if the only utility was the feel good factor of "voicing my opinion" and voting was genuinely entirely ineffective that makes the insignificant opportunity cost worthwhile.

The same way you have found positive utility in arguing on this thread (much more effort than I take to vote) purely because you find positive utility in voicing your opinion on this subject, even though in the grand scheme of things the posts you have made in this thread will have an entirely negligible effect on anything.

>>1486919
>electronic voting is too vulnerable to exploitation

>>1487054
How about this. You get a dozen texts through out the day saying "Did you vote yet? Remember to vote!" until you vote. Then there's a trivial cost of receiving 12 slightly annoying texts compared to the trivial opportunity cost of voting. Even blocking the number would take more effort than voting.

>>1487062
Or voting could be compulsory.
>you'll participate in a democracy and you'll like it!

>>1487062

I'm appreciate the support, anon, but I'm not sure these examples are helping my case.

My initial (and genuine) example was the fact I have to take a two minute diversion on my way to work and tick a box in order to vote. I could also vote by post if I wanted to.

These things already have a virtually insignificant cost without postulating the possible use of internet or phone voting or getting into compulsory or semi-forced voting.

>>1487054
>The same way you have found positive utility in arguing on this thread (much more effort than I take to vote) purely because you find positive utility in voicing your opinion on this subject
But we both obviously post on here already, so why do we need to vote to get le feefees for "voicing our opinions"? The benefit is zero, because anyone I know that cares already knows which candidate I support whether I vote or not.

Plus, I COULD convince some amount of people, who in turn could each convince some amount of people each. Not a huge chance, but better than voting, and much easier. As well, actually writing my thoughts out actually helps me solidify precisely what I think (more of my views than I'd care to admit are formalized in the process of posting them on 4chan than I'd care to admit), and there's intrinsic value in that, at least to me. But voting? None whatsoever.

>inb4 that's just you tho
Everyone's situation an exact calculation of opportunity cost will be different, a generalized and abstracted case is no more valid than my individual case, because it's unlikely very many people actually relate to either.

>>1487127
>But we both obviously post on here already, so why do we need to vote to get le feefees for "voicing our opinions"?

Calm down. You can presumably vote already without any effort and I am talking about positive utility in economic terms, which is what the central argument of the article is based on.

Don't get upset and start going on about "feefees" etc, that's just boring in what could be a decent thread. Presumably if you live in a developed country most of your costs go on things that make you feel good, that's part of what positive utility is.

>Everyone's situation an exact calculation of opportunity cost will be different,

That's why you would crunch econometric data to work out what the cost of voting is. And from a practical perspective it is perfectly possibly to bring down the cost of voting with policies, such as more convenient polling booths, if there is a genuine issue.

The central problem here is that philosophers have nicked a premise from economics and then completely forgotten they need to crunch the numbers if they are claiming there is a significant cost to voters just to vote.

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>>1487066
Voting is essentially compulsory where I live. You're fined if you don't go. Anyone who's out of the country or otherwise incapacitated can have someone else to do it for them.

Is anyone in this thread implying that Americans choose the next figurehead of their country or are they actually smart enough to realise it's chosen for them and the voting just keeps them placated and feeling like they're a part of the system?