Campaign donations from special interests determine which measures get on the ballot and they have grown increasingly long and complex, defying voters’ attempts to understand them.

Californians vote on many ballot measures, but we rarely participate in significant public discussions about their content and impact.

This isn’t simply a result of apathy or poor civic education. Rather, it’s an example of “rational ignorance,” a term coined by economist Anthony Downs in his 1957 book, “An Economic Theory of Democracy,” that defines this democratic reality: Since you have just one vote out of millions, your vote doesn’t much matter. So, it’s rational to not devote precious time to reaching well-considered decisions about how you vote.

And when too many of us remain rationally ignorant, our election results don’t match the public interest.

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This year, however, Stanford University political scientists want to counter our rational ignorance with an advanced tool: a digital Deliberative Poll.

The poll would allow hundreds of Californians to deliberate over certain ballot measures. One set of likely candidates for deliberation is three competing constitutional amendments involving the voting requirements for taxes.

Here’s how digital deliberative polls work. Stanford’s Deliberative Democracy Lab assembles a representative sample of the California electorate. Participants are paid for their time and reimbursed for child- or........

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