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"the [science fiction] writer should be able to convince the reader (and himself) that the wonders he is describing really can come true...and that gets tricky when you take a good, hard look at the world around you."
- Frederik Pohl
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| Lawyer Program | ||
| Software that could listen to legal argument. |
If you get in trouble, you'd better know the URL of a good lawyer program.
| Spivey held up one hand. "First I must tell you, Mr. Eng, that what we're about to discuss is highly classified. Top secret."
Logan winced. "I want my lawyer program." The officer smiled placatingly. "I assure you it's all legal..." |
| Technovelgy from Earth,
by David Brin. Published by Bantam in 1990 Additional resources -
|
In the book, lawyer programs are also described as being good for investigating how to work with (and around) existing laws:
Not that fighting was strictly illegal. Some gangs with good lawyer programs had found loopholes and tricks. Ra Boys, in particular, were brutal with sarcasm... pushing a guy so hard he'd lose his temper, and accept a nighttime battle rendezvous or some suicidal dare...
It's not exactly the same, but a lawyer program has to talk to someone - or something. See the robot judge from Harry Harrison's 1959 story Robot Justice. That robot must be running some kind of legal software. Also, see the law clerk robot from Pohl's The Midas Plague.
As far as I know, the first "knowledge-based systems" for the law appeared in the early 1980's. The prize for earliest speculation on this topic goes to lawyers themselves, and dates from a 1949 paper by Lee Loevinger titled Jurimetrics. The Next Step Forward.
But even though no geeps were watching now, dozens must have recorded both parties converging on this spot... chronicle's they'd happily zap-fax to police investigating a brawl after the fact.
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Lawyer Program-related
news articles:
- AI Software 'Robot' Lawyers Next Year
- 'Expert System' Found Practicing Law Without License
- FrontlineSMS Legal Justice Via Cell Phone
- Legal 'e-Discovery' Software Replaces Lawyers
- Law Firms To Undergo 'Structural Collapse' Due Artificially Intelligent Systems
- DoNotPay Lawyer Program Contests Parking Tickets
- 'Do Not Pay' Chatbots To Replace Law Firm Associates?
- Legal Profession Now Fairly Bristling With AI
| Has Elon Musk Given Up On Mars? |
| 'They Erased My Memory' Says Ariana Grande |
| 'Spikeless' Brand Swizzle Stick Detects Spiked Drinks |
| Musk Proposes Sites For Martian Cities |
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'Their only check on the growth and development of Vulcan 3 lay in two clues: the amount of rock thrown up to the surface... and the amount of the raw materials and tools and parts which the computer requested.'
'I guess there's nobody round this table who doesn't have a Crosswell [tapeworm] working for him in the small intestine.'
'Figments of his mind in one sense, of course, for he had shaped them...'
'So the parent drone carries a spotter that it launches...'
'...nurse drones that would cruise around dumping large amounts of power into randomly selected pods.'
'It's done with a flip of the third joint of the tentacle on the down beat.'
'...for months Grantline bores had dug into the cliff.'
'I hope all those other cars are on automatic,' he said anxiously.
'It’s smart enough to go wrong in very complicated ways, but not smart enough to help us find out what’s wrong.'
