Controlling and augmenting legal inferencing: ysh, a case study

ABSTRACT

If legal inferencing systems are to be used for immediate practical application, they are best constructed by embedding them in other technologies which can assist in augmenting and controlling the course of inferencing. Adoption of a (quasi) natural language knowledge representation assists easier development of user interpretative facilities, user control of the course of inferencing and explanation facilities. The paper explains how the DataLex Workstation Software, particularly its inference engine, ysh, implements these approaches.

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INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  I. Computing Methodologies
  I.2 ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
      I.2.1 Applications and Expert Systems
          Subjects: Law

Additional Classification:
  I. Computing Methodologies
  I.2 ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
      I.2.4 Knowledge Representation Formalisms and Methods
          Subjects: Representations (procedural and rule-based)

General Terms:
Algorithms, Legal Aspects