Algorithm Predicts US Supreme Court Decisions 70% of Time

stephendavion writes A legal scholar says he and colleagues have developed an algorithm that can predict, with 70 percent accuracy, whether the US Supreme Court will uphold or reverse the lower-court decision before it. "Using only data available prior to the date of decision, our model correctly identifies 69.7 percent of the Court's overall affirm and reverse decisions and correctly forecasts 70.9% of the votes of individual justices across 7,700 cases and more than 68,000 justice votes," Josh Blackman, a South Texas College of Law scholar, wrote on his blog Tuesday.

Comments

biased algorith

[Dthief]

I (read: anyone) can make an algorithm that fits any previous data (even only using data that precedes the "prediction")......testing future predictability is the only way this means anything.

Re:biased algorith

[Anonymous Coward]

That's why you should always divide your data set into one subset for fitting/training of the algorithm, and another subset to verify its predictive ability.

The algo doesn't know or care whether the data is actually from the future. That is irrelevant as long as it wasn't fitted on it.

Re:biased algorith

[Euler]

You could train it with 80% of the historical data and see if it predicts the next 20% of historical data.

Useless

[Jiro]

According to http://www.scotusblog.com/stat... the Supreme Court recently affirmed 27% of lower court decisions and reversed 73%. This means that if you guess that the Supreme Court reverses the lower court every time, you'll be 73% accurate. 70% accuracy is ridiculously low if you can get 73% accuracy *without* taking into consideration the records of each justice or any other kind of details.

Simplified algorithm

[mwvdlee]

if defendant.bank_balance > plaintiff.bank_balance
      winner = defendant
else
      winner = plaintiff

I'd guess about 90% accurate.

Re:Simplified algorithm

[swillden]

my algorithm is even better, and even more accurate. its simple: What is the worst possible outcome for the citizenry?

I don't know about the accuracy of your SCOTUS result-picking algorithm, but you and mwvdlee have a good algorithm to get modded up on slashdot: Just express deep cynicism about the system. Doesn't have to be true in the slightest.

FWIW, I watch SCOTUS pretty closely, and I'd say their bad decisions are fairly rare. I'm unhappy with the outcome in a larger minority of cases, but it's not very common that upon reading the opinions and dissents that I find myself ultimately in disagreement with their conclusions. And in most cases I think they not only make the right legal call, but the right call for the citizenry (though that isn't, and shouldn't be, their primary focus).

Of course, you and I may well disagree about some of the decisions.

Re:Replace them

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

Lawyers: We want people to carry their rights with them, even when operating as a group of people Congress defined as a "corporation" because Congress cannot force them to give up their First Amendment rights.

Scotus (in the voice of Nomad): Logic correct. Opposing lawyers are in error. Must sterilize.

I can predict better than 90%

[mspohr]

The Supreme Court is dominated by a bunch of fanatic right wing corporate toadies.
So, the decision comes down in favor of corporations (on economic issues) or social conservatives (on social issues).
The Constitution has nothing to do with it.
The Supreme Court is the ultimate cheerleader for our fascist state.