The focus of this book is on the epistemological and hermeneutic implications of data science and artificial intelligence for democracy and the Rule of Law. How do the normative effects of automated decision systems or the interventions of robotic fellow ‘beings’ compare to the legal effect of written and unwritten law? To investigate these questions the book brings together two disciplinary perspectives rarely combined within the framework of one volume. One starts from the perspective of ‘code and law’ and the other develops from the domain of ‘law and literature’. Integrating original analyses of relevant novels or films, the authors discuss how computational technologies challenge traditional forms of legal thought and affect the regulation of human behavior. Thus, pertinent questions are raised about the theoretical assumptions underlying both scientific and legal practice.

The challenges faced by privacy laws in changing technological, commercial and social environments are considered in this broad-ranging 2006 examination of privacy law. The book encompasses three overlapping areas of analysis: privacy protection under the general law; legislative measures for data protection in digital communications networks; and the influence of transnational agreements and other pressures toward harmonised privacy standards. Leading, internationally recognised authors discuss developments across these three areas in the UK, Europe, the US, APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation), Australia and New Zealand. Chapters draw on doctrinal and historical analysis of case law, theoretical approaches to both freedom of speech and privacy, and the interaction of law and communications technologies in order to examine present and future challenges to law's engagement with privacy.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 12th IFIP TC 9 International Conference on Human Choice and Computers, HCC12 2016, held in Salford, UK, in September 2016. The 26 revised full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 34 submissions. The papers deal with the constantly evolving intimate relationship between humans and technology. They focus on three main themes: ethics, communications, and futures.

This book introduces law to computer scientists and other folk. Computer scientists develop, protect, and maintain computing systems in the broad sense of that term, whether hardware (a smartphone, a driverless car, a smart energy meter, a laptop, or a server), software (a program, an application programming interface or API, a module, code), or data (captured via cookies, sensors, APIs, or manual input). Computer scientists may be focused on security (e.g. cryptography), or on embedded systems (e.g. the Internet of Things), or on data science (e.g. machine learning). They may be closer to mathematicians or to electrical or electronic engineers, or they may work on the cusp of hardware and software, mathematical proofs and empirical testing. This book conveys the internal logic of legal practice, offering a hands-on introduction to the relevant domains of law, while firmly grounded in legal theory. It bridges the gap between two scientific practices, by presenting a coherent picture of the grammar and vocabulary of law and the rule of law, geared to those with no wish to become lawyers but nevertheless required to consider the salience of legal rights and obligations. Simultaneously, this book will help lawyers to review their own trade. It is a volume on law in an onlife world, presenting a grounded argument of what law does (speech act theory), how it emerged in the context of printed text (philosophy of technology), and how it confronts its new, data-driven environment. Book jacket.

In this book Barry de Vries provides an in-depth doctrinal consideration of the issue of individual responsibility for autonomous weapons.

This book focuses on the legal regulation, mainly from an international law perspective, of autonomous artificial intelligence systems, of their creations, as well as of the interaction of human and artificial intelligence. It examines critical questions regarding both the ontology of autonomous AI systems and the legal implications: what constitutes an autonomous AI system and what are its unique characteristics? How do they interact with humans? What would be the implications of combined artificial and human intelligence? It also explores potentially the most important questions: what are the implications of these developments for collective security –from both a state-centered and a human perspective, as well as for legal systems? Why is international law better positioned to make such determinations and to create a universal framework for this new type of legal personality? How can the matrix of obligations and rights of this new legal personality be construed and what would be the repercussions for the international community? In order to address these questions, the book discusses cognitive aspects embedded in the framework of law, offering insights based on both de lege lata and de lege ferenda perspectives.

Artificial intelligence and related technologies are changing both the law and the legal profession. In particular, technological advances in fields ranging from machine learning to more advanced robots, including sensors, virtual realities, algorithms, bots, drones, self-driving cars, and more sophisticated “human-like” robots are creating new and previously unimagined challenges for regulators. These advances also give rise to new opportunities for legal professionals to make efficiency gains in the delivery of legal services. With the exponential growth of such technologies, radical disruption seems likely to accelerate in the near future. This collection brings together a series of contributions by leading scholars in the newly emerging field of artificial intelligence, robotics, and the law. The aim of the book is to enrich legal debates on the social meaning and impact of this type of technology. The distinctive feature of the contributions presented in this edition is that they address the impact of these technological developments in a number of different fields of law and from the perspective of diverse jurisdictions. Moreover, the authors utilize insights from multiple related disciplines, in particular social theory and philosophy, in order to better understand and address the legal challenges created by AI. Therefore, the book will contribute to interdisciplinary debates on disruptive new AI technologies and the law.