The AI judge: next stop?
The recent advances in technology, and particularly artificial intelligence, are having an extremely profound effect on very diverse sectors, including that of the judiciary in its various manifestations. The work presented here analyses some of the more recent developments in artificial intelligence in the field of the application of law, with the aim of discerning the point up to which we are approaching the idea – not so utopian now – of the AI judge and the automated application of law. The analysis is structured in three different areas, which are at the same time complimentary: firstly, there is an analysis of the conceptual aspect (what distinct elements and activities involve the judicial application of law, with the aim of determining what processes would be necessary to automate in order to be able to speak of an “AI judge”); secondly, a number of recent technologies and applications are presented which would influence in some way the application of law, with the purpose of determining at what point we would find ourselves with respect to a process of automation; and finally, there will be a brief reflection on the possible positive or negative effects an automation of the application of law would involve.
David Martínez ZorrillaDavid Martínez (Manresa, 1974) is a graduate in Law with Award for Special Distinction (1997) from the Autonomous University of Barcelona, and holds a doctorate in Law (2004) from Pompeu Fabra University. He is currently an associate professor in the Faculty of Law and Political Science at UOC and an instructor at ESERP Business School, and is specialised in the field of general theory and the philosophy of law. He is the author of several monographs and academic articles in Spanish and international publications, most notably “Constitutional Conflicts, Deliberation and Normative Uncertainty” (Marcial Pons, 2007); “Legal Methodology and Argumentation” (Marcial Pons, 2010); “The Structure of Conflicts of Fundamental Legal Rights”, in Law & Philosophy, vol. 30 (2011); “Constitutional Dilemmas and Balancing. Some Comments on Lorenzo Zucca’s Analysis”, in Ratio Juris, vol. 24 (2011); “Some Thoughts About the Limits of Alexy’s Conception of Principles and Balancing”, in Duarte, D. and Silva Sampaio, J. (Eds.). Proportionality in Law. An Analytical Perspective (Springer, 2018).
