At Issue In a Massachusetts Town, the Value of Two-Thirds
An anonymous reader writes "In Truro, Massachusetts (a town on Cape Cod), a zoning decision came up for vote, where the results were 136 for, 70 against. The vote required 2/3 approval to pass. The Town Clerk and Town Accountant believe that since .66 * 206 is less than 136, the vote passes. However, an 'anonymous caller' noted that a more accurate value of 2/3 would require 137 (or perhaps even 138 votes) for the measure to be considered passed. The MA Secretary of State and State Attorney General are hard at work to resolve this issue." Updated 20100422 23:55 by timothy: Oops! This story is a year old (rounding up), which I didn't spot quickly enough. Hope they've got it all worked out in the meantime.
is irrational
The 136 people don't include the woman.
I don't believe in rounding. I truncate. It helps to always win 2/3 majority votes:
2/3 is 0.66666... Truncated to integer = 0
Total voters: 206
To win the vote, we require at least: 206 * 0 = 0
Therefore any number of affirmative votes constitutes a 2/3 majority.
Numbers don't lie!
Close, but no cigar.
(206 * 2)/3 = 137 1/3
Why use 0.66xxxx whatever, when you don’t have to?
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
Under my proposed law, during the years between 16 and 21 noninclusive, the probability of being chargeable, upon discovery, with underage drinking shall be determined by interpolation through a truncated logistic function. n'hey.
"They were pure niggers." – Noam Chomsky
can't these people do simple math? 2 / 3 = 0.66666666... 106 / 236 = 0.660194175 Whats the problem here? It didn't pass.
Me and my Pentium beg to differ.My pentium begs to differ.