METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR ROBUST SOCIAL CHOICES AND VOTE ELICITATION
First Claim
1. A computer network implemented system for suggesting a group decision, the system, characterized in that the system comprises:
- (a) one or more server computers, connected to an interconnected network of computers, and linked to a server application;
(b) the server application includes or is linked to an intelligent voting manager that;
(i) receives as input a plurality of options over which a group of voters have certain preferences (“
voter preferences”
), and from which one or more options must be selected by the group of voters to establish the group decision;
(ii) receives as input information about the voting preferences of one or more voters for one or more of the plurality of options, wherein the voting preferences may relate to (A) all of the possible voting preferences given the plurality of options (“
complete preference information”
) or (B) a subset of the possible voting preferences given the plurality of options (“
partial preference information”
, complete preference information or partial preference information being “
preference information”
), wherein the voter preferences are expressible as pairwise preferences;
(iii) is configured to generate one or more suggested group decisions, whether the intelligent voting manager receives complete preference information or partial preference information, the suggested group decisions being generated based on the highest guaranteed level of group decision satisfaction relative to the received complete preference information or partial preference information, using the pairwise preferences; and
(iv) initiates the presentation of one or more suggested group decisions as output to the one or more voters.
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Accused Products
Abstract
The present invention is a system, method and computer program for generating an optimal decision based on general, incomplete decision-making input, such as incomplete preferences. Input may be provided from a variety of entities (including human and computer entities). The present invention may be operable to utilize such input to make a set of decisions and an optimal decision may be efficiently generated, even if the input represents incomplete voter preferences. The present invention may also undertake a decision-making process that involves a facility to compute minimax regret and to elicit preferences from a voter. Preferences may be elicited by one or more queries posed to a voter about their pairwise preferences in such a way so as to maximally reduce minimax regret. The type of queries and order of queries posed may be determined in accordance with the most efficient decision-making process to arrive efficiently at the optimal decision. In this manner the present invention may guide the decision-making process to support and elicit efficient decision-making.
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Citations
21 Claims
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1. A computer network implemented system for suggesting a group decision, the system, characterized in that the system comprises:
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(a) one or more server computers, connected to an interconnected network of computers, and linked to a server application; (b) the server application includes or is linked to an intelligent voting manager that; (i) receives as input a plurality of options over which a group of voters have certain preferences (“
voter preferences”
), and from which one or more options must be selected by the group of voters to establish the group decision;(ii) receives as input information about the voting preferences of one or more voters for one or more of the plurality of options, wherein the voting preferences may relate to (A) all of the possible voting preferences given the plurality of options (“
complete preference information”
) or (B) a subset of the possible voting preferences given the plurality of options (“
partial preference information”
, complete preference information or partial preference information being “
preference information”
), wherein the voter preferences are expressible as pairwise preferences;(iii) is configured to generate one or more suggested group decisions, whether the intelligent voting manager receives complete preference information or partial preference information, the suggested group decisions being generated based on the highest guaranteed level of group decision satisfaction relative to the received complete preference information or partial preference information, using the pairwise preferences; and (iv) initiates the presentation of one or more suggested group decisions as output to the one or more voters. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18)
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19. A computer implemented method for generating one or more suggested group decisions, characterized in that the method comprises:
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(a) receiving as input a plurality of options over which a group of voters have certain preferences (“
voter preferences”
), and from which one or more options must be selected by the group of voters to establish the group decision;(b) receiving input information about the voting preferences of one or more voters for one or more of the plurality of options, wherein the voting preferences may relate to (A) all of the possible voting preferences given the plurality of options (“
complete preference information”
) or (B) a subset of the possible voting preferences given the plurality of options (“
partial preference information”
, complete preference information or partial preference information being “
preference information”
);(c) logging the preference information as a set of pairwise preferences; (d) generating one or more suggested group decisions using the pairwise preferences, whether the intelligent voting manager receives complete preference information or partial preference information, the suggested group decisions being generated based on the highest guaranteed level of group decision satisfaction relative to the received complete preference information or partial preference information; and (e) initiating the presentation of one or more suggested group decisions as output to the one or more voters. - View Dependent Claims (20, 21)
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Specification