Your Lawyer May Soon Be an Algorithm

[Natural Citizen]

There are now legal predictive algorithms that are able to predict case outcomes. What do yuns think of them apples? Heh...

Katz, who works at Michigan State University, recently published a ​paper in which he claimed a computer model was able to successfully predict US Supreme Court decisions 70 percent of the time. The model used “only data available prior to the date of decision,” effectively comparing similar cases in order to forecast the logical outcome

Not only is it more efficient, but couldn’t it somehow be more just to place decisions in an entity unable to be swayed by bias or emotion”

The robotic revolution has been predicted to spread its techno-tendrils far and wide in the job market, and a recent repo​rt by UK consultancy firm Jomati Consultants suggests that they’ll be creeping ​ever further into the legal profession by 2030. The report suggests that the “economic model of law firms is heading for a structural revolution, some might say a structural collapse.”

While robots stealing jobs is nothing new, that lawyers could see their jobs be automated might seem surprising on the surface. In a much-publicised 2013 report that predicted 47 percent of US jobs were at risk of automation in the next two decades, authors Carl Frey and Michael Osborne put lawyers at comparative low risk of robotic replacement. In a recent follow​-up focusing on the UK job market, they also named law as one of the professions at the least risk of roboticization, alongside sectors including financial services and engineering.

Continued - http://motherboard.vice.com/read/your-lawyer-may-soon-be-an-algorithm


Aside... 5-foot-tall ‘Robocops’ start patrolling Silicon Valley

 

[tod evans]

'Puters programmed to lie cheat and steal.....

Once all the lawyers are out of "work" the politicians will be next......

 

[thoughtomator]

It can just spit out every time that you'll be convicted at trial and be 90%+ correct. Our courts' conviction rate exceeds that of the Nazi courts.

 

[Natural Citizen]

Relevant reading from our friends at the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA)...

Below is a list of IARPA’s research.

http://www.iarpa.gov/index.php/research-programs

 

[Zippyjuan]

Not only is it more efficient, but couldn’t it somehow be more just to place decisions in an entity unable to be swayed by bias or emotion”

The algorithm is predicting what biased and emotional people have decided in the past. It will include human biases.

Laws can be ambiguous and "facts" of a case can be ambiguous which is why people have to go to court to resolve them.

 

[willwash]

There are now legal predictive algorithms that are able to predict case outcomes. What do yuns think of them apples? Heh...


Continued - http://motherboard.vice.com/read/your-lawyer-may-soon-be-an-algorithm


Aside... 5-foot-tall ‘Robocops’ start patrolling Silicon Valley

This algorithm would be fairly easy to make. The Supreme Court rules on political questions, and the justices vote according to their political beliefs, not legal construction. (This is a well-established phenomenon called the Attitudinal Model--Google it.) To make an algorithm, simply tag special interest groups who submit amicus briefs as well as the justices as "liberal" or "conservative". Then for each case, look at the amicus curae briefs submitted (and who submitted it), how they recommend the Supreme Court dispose of the case. Separate the amicus curae briefs into "liberal" and "conservative" piles and assume the conservative justices will vote with the conservative pile and liberals will vote with the liberal pile.

This will work in most cases and a computer could do it.

 

[Acala]

Machines won't replace lawyers because lawyers won't let them. Lawyers are among the biggest spenders on lobbying and campaign contributions. There is a reason lawyers have a monopoly on access to the courts and it has nothing to do with protecting the public. And it is the same reason they will not be replaced by machines.

 

[fisharmor]

Machines won't replace lawyers because lawyers won't let them. Lawyers are among the biggest spenders on lobbying and campaign contributions. There is a reason lawyers have a monopoly on access to the courts and it has nothing to do with protecting the public. And it is the same reason they will not be replaced by machines.

BINGO

Let's also not forget who it is who runs for and wins political office in greatest numbers, to go on to become the very people who would be tasked with crafting any such law.
They'd never kill their golden-egged goose.


ALSO, the idea of having computers decide outcomes is more insidious than most people will ever realize.
It's never going to happen, but just by floating the idea, they've acclimated everyone to what we have.
And what we have is already incredibly automated.
We have multiple rubber-stampers along the way to a prosecution.
The cop has to do what he's told,
the state attorney has to do what he's told,
the magistrate has to do what he's told,
everyone at the indictment has to do what they're told,
if there's a grand jury, everyone on it has to do what they're told,
et cetera,
et cetera.

If any ONE of those people bucked the system and didn't automatically do what he was told, then there would be no conviction.

What we need is far less automation, not more.

 

[Dr.3D]

Machines won't replace lawyers because lawyers won't let them. Lawyers are among the biggest spenders on lobbying and campaign contributions. There is a reason lawyers have a monopoly on access to the courts and it has nothing to do with protecting the public. And it is the same reason they will not be replaced by machines.

Imagine how many fewer lawyers would be needed if even half the laws were repealed. This I'm pretty sure is why it will never happen.

 

[Occam's Banana]

Garbage in, garbage out.

 

[fisharmor]

It can just spit out every time that you'll be convicted at trial and be 90%+ correct. Our courts' conviction rate exceeds that of the Nazi courts.

 

[TheTexan]

The application of law wouldn't be that hard to automate from a technical perspective. It would just be a lot of work. There would of course still be a need for lawyers, to use the automation tools correctly, and to account for exceptions in places where the law does not apply (for example police officers)

 

[CPUd]

One of the sample datasets in WEKA is legislative vote history by party affiliation, and is damn good at prediction of future votes.

For those interested, here is a good blog to check out:
http://legalinformatics.wordpress.com/

 

[Ronin Truth]

Something like 70+% of all of the lawyers in the whole world are right here in the good old USA. (and unfortunately it really shows.)

Who else can afford them? Bring on the super computers, lawyers in a box. (There's a good lawyer joke in there someplace.)