Re: [AGA Contest] various replies, incl judging...

["S. Hieber" <shieber@yahoo.com>]

Combining subjective views, even if the views are dressed
up in the apparent precison of mathemetics is a subjective
thing -- a second order subjectivity -- even if the method
of combining is dressed in mathematics.

Personally, I am inclined to think that an entry everyone
thought was second best should probably win second and not
first even if the judges all disagreed about which should
be first -- but that way you might not have a "first".
Undoubtedly, many would find the method screwy. I supposes
you could send the judges back with the top ten (by the
place-vote method (screwy)) and ask them to vote again,
progressively forcing them them down to ranking a few
entries.

But for any complexity we add, there's an argument for and
against it. Which I think boils down to an argument to
keeping it simple.


We could let each judge cast say 3 votes for 1st place, 3
for second, and 3 for 3rd. Wouldn't increase the odds that
an entry would have the most 1st votes. But at best it
would only push the problem off a bit, and maybe down a
little deeper.

Instead of voting for first, second, etc. We could have
votes for outstanding. You might have one winner in one
category and thre or four in another. "This year we had
four outstanding performances by actors in leading roles so
we're handing out four Oscars thre but the supporting
performances were all kinda medicocre this year so we're
saving on the statues in that category."

sh
> On Sunday 23 May 2004 10:52, Eric wrote:
> 
> > I guess the fundamental question is: If you are faced
> with a category in
> > which each judge awarded a different tank first place,
> but no two judges
> > agreed, but there was a third or fourth place tank
> which all judges
> > thought was good but not as "striking" as their
> respective first place
> > choice, which tank would you think should get the
> ribbon?  If you think
> > it's one of the first-placers, then we should go with
> harmonic means.  If
> > you think it should be the "common ground", then we
> should stick with what
> > we have.
> 
> That's a good and realistic example.  I don't think that
> an entry that *no* 
> judge believed was best in the category should end up
> with a first-place win. 
>  I don't understand what point there is to getting judges
> with individual 
> tastes and known abilities, then using a scoring method
> that cancels out 
> their differences to arrive at a uniformly bland result. 
>  An entry deamed by 
> all judges to be competent but mundane should never win
> over an entry that is 
> inspired but controversial.
> 
> In some ideal world the judges would be able to pool
> their opinions and 
> arrive at a mutually agreeable ranking.  I don't know of
> any way to make that 
> happen.


=====
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