Online Voting - Would You Vote For It?

I am calling for voting in elections to be placed online (see me actually calling for change here). I first wanted to change this because I have seen first hand what happens when there is too much of an opportunity cost to vote--people just won't vote (as shown in this post).

In talking with others about this idea, I have received quite the array of feedback. Someone commented about how a change like this would affect tradition. Many people commented on how we are using technology in many other areas, so why not use technology in this one? One person mentioned the possibility of eliminating voting and using statistics and random assignment of the population to get us a true representative government (as shown here), others disagreed with that idea. Those who disagreed felt that we didn't want a "fully representative" government. This brought up interesting ideas about what we want when we say we want a voice. Do we actually want one? Or do we just enjoy the idea of it without actually putting it into practice?

Big Data and Social Scientists

Mathematics as a Safegaurd

After discussing melding mathematics, statistics and social sciences more with a Math Ed graduate student I got to interview one of BYU’s Math Education Faculty.  Our discussion was insightful as he sympathized with putting data analysis into social science classes and making math courses somewhat more exploratory in nature.

He naturally cautioned against pushing this too far, relating that people can learn to think well without mathematics.  He did, however, note that even those who are not interested in researching or using mathematics are often unequipped to evaluate and avoid financial predation of organizations who understand math and statistics all too well.  He emphasized learning the math of finance and understanding how to interpret statistical data and look at both critically.  Many people are deceived by arguments involving numeric data today and there are certain nuances to this sort of information that most college graduates are sadly unaware of.

Thomas Hobbs would have called for authority to prevent men from taking advantage of each other using numbers or finances.  I see that is what we need today as well.  The authority should build up the common man with the understanding they need to critically evaluate numeric data and analysis.  This skill can be taught in mathematics and statistics classes, then also reinforced and applied in social science classes, and it can be done for youth and adolescents as well.