**** Elections thread *****

[wufwugy]

The important word here is 'votes'. Note how it is different that 'a vote'. You're conflating the two.

Looking at it this way doesn't tell much of the story. If the reasoning that the individual vote doesn't matter was correct, it would also be correct to say that voting itself doesn't matter, yet that is clearly not the case. If somebody wants to understand the vote, they can't just do a couple bits of arithmetic and call it a day.

How you do you know that? They could have dumped ten billion dollars into ads, hired people to go door to door, used all kinds of tricks, and changed the vote decisively. But not because they influenced one person, because they influenced thousands or hundreds of thousands or millions.

The causality those things have with influencing the vote is weak.

We've mostly been taught that history is about big men, but academia has been coming around to the better explanation that history is about movements and ideas.

But if you think it's because you've got a good chance of making a difference with your one vote, you're just deluded and nothing more.

I don't think that, but the cool thing is that "does your vote count" is not the question. Nobody's vote counts and yet voting counts. Square that circle.

[Poopadoop]

I don't think that, but the cool thing is that "does your vote count" is not the question. Nobody's vote counts and yet voting counts. Square that circle.

It's not a circle and it doesn't need squaring. I've already explained why one vote out of a large number of votes means a very small amount. Add a whole lot of very small amounts together and you get a big amount. That doesn't mean any one of those little small amounts is meaningful on its own; only their sum is meaningful.

Here's another way of looking at that might make you happier. If America lasts for a million years, there is a good chance that a POTUS election will be decided by a single vote one or two times. If that happens to be this election and you don't vote, then you'll be kicking yourself because you let the bad guys win. So you should go vote.

[wufwugy]

It's not a circle and it doesn't need squaring. I've already explained why one vote out of a large number of votes means a very small amount. Add a whole lot of very small amounts together and you get a big amount. That doesn't mean any one of those little small amounts is meaningful on its own; only their sum is meaningful.

Here's another way of looking at that might make you happier. If America lasts for a million years, there is a good chance that a POTUS election will be decided by a single vote one or two times. If that happens to be this election and you don't vote, then you'll be kicking yourself because you let the bad guys win. So you should go vote.

We're ultimately talking about two different things. I think that whether or not my vote counts is irrelevant to the question of whether or not voting matters. This may sum up what I'm getting at: my vote doesn't count, but the vote counts, which means my vote counts even when it doesn't.

[Poopadoop]

We're ultimately talking about two different things. I think that whether or not my vote counts is irrelevant to the question of whether or not voting matters. This may sum up what I'm getting at: my vote doesn't count, but the vote counts, which means my vote counts even when it doesn't.

Ya we are definitely talking about two different things.