BakerHostetler Hires Artificial Intelligent Attorney 'Ross' (fortune.com)

An anonymous reader writes: Futurism reports, Ross, the first artificially intelligent attorney, was just hired by the global law firm Baker and Hostetler. The firm announced they hired a robot lawyer created by ROSS Intelligence. Ross was built on IBM's Watson and is fully capable of understanding your questions, responding with a hypothesis backed by references and citations. It provides you with the most relevant information you are looking for rather than thousands of results you'd need to sift though. In addition, it can notify you about recent court decisions that may or may not affect your case, and it will continue to learn based off each experience it encounters. ROSS Intelligence co-founder and CEO says other law firms have also signed licenses with Ross.

Comments

So it's a glorified Paralegal, then?

[Penguinisto]

Figure it would be more accurate to call it a paralegal than a full practicing attorney with a bar that has admitted it.

And yes, pedantry and the legal profession go hand-in-hand, so I figure it's appropriate to do that here.

Re:So it's a glorified Paralegal, then?

[Holi]

licensed would be the correct term, It sounds like they are purchasing access to something like WestLaw with a better search engine.

Paid search engine?

[sims 2]

So is Watson going to turn into a paid search engine then?
This seems to be a start in that direction.

Re:Paid search engine?

[Hentes]

It does look like that. Question is, is it smarter than current search engines?

Re:Paid search engine?

[ffkom]

It's not really smarter. You place a question and Watson does not even try to "understand" its semantic or parse its grammatical structure - Watson will just find you amongst any number of documents stored the ones and the paragraphs in them that statistically seem to most likely address your "search phrase" (which is your question). From my experiments with Watson I'd say it's not too different in what it can do for you from classical search engines. Especially, Watson cannot draw any "conclusion" or combine the content of different documents to "answer" your questions, it will always present you with a text (excerpt) of any one document.

Brilliant

[110010001000]

Pair this with an autonomous car and you can have a robot who chases ambulances.

love child

[zlives]

not really a lawyer, sounds more like a love child of google and lexus nexus
and we know lawyers aren't born of a loving relationship.

Re:love child

[hcs_$reboot]

And sometimes Ross loses it totally and repeats "We were on a break!"

Re:Can an A.I. Judge be Far Behind?

[fizzup]

I can't imagine an A.I. taking into account the ways in which a human jury can be swayed.

You need a better imagination

wellllp

[vel-ex-tech]

Bye, bye buggy whip manufacturers!

Say, since we know that workers in one job can simply be retrained for another more awesome job that will open up because we have cars instead of horse and buggy, I had a question.

How many minerals and how much vespene gas does it cost to upgrade a Lawyer unit into an AI technician unit? What's the cool down on that? I just need to construct additional code.orgs if I want to hurry it along, right? And they don't count against my available supply depos while they're being upgraded, right?

What's the alternative, just shoot them?

Er, nevermind, I think I answered my own question. They're lawyers. Just shoot them.

Personally I would rather be tortured by AI

[Crashmarik]

Than Lawyers. The better lawyers can understand your pain and exploit it.

Re:Can an A.I. Judge be Far Behind?

[JaredOfEuropa]

Just watch the pilot episode of Lexx to see how that is going to suck:

Robo-defense: "My client - [Zev Bellringer of B3K] - is innocent of the charge of failing to perform her wifely duties, and throws herself upon the mercy of this court, secure in the knowledge that His Shadow's wisdom will prevail upon these proceedings"

Robo-judge: "You - [Zev Bellringer of B3K] - have been found guilty of failing to perform your wifely duties, and humiliating your husband in the temple. You are therefore sentenced to be transformed into a love slave, and to be given to Seminary 166145 to be used for their pleasure, may His Merciful Shadow fall upon you"

About time, overpaid lawyers

[Snotnose]

2 years ago my neighbor went batshit crazy, pounding on my door, claiming I was peeking in her bedroom window at 3 AM, claiming I walked into her living room and kissed her, claiming I walked into her unit, into the bedroom, and went through her closet, etc etc etc. She called the cops on me several times claiming all sorts of crap, including I threw a bowl of piss on her, then finally filed a restraining order against me. Not being stupid, I hired a lawyer. Cost me $1500. Spent maybe 3 hours with the guy, 2 of which were repeating my story 3 times (never mind I'd documented everything and given him the printout), 1 was actually in court.

She claimed I was doing this for some 9 months, yet the sheriff had no record of her ever calling them until she started harassing me. First time they came out I told my story, and one of them said "oh, that's were she went". Hmmm. Finally, she brought a witness into court. Witness 100% contradicted her story.

The real pisser? I asked the judge for legal expenses. He gave me half. Even though it was 100% clear to everyone in the courtroom she was 100% full of shit, he only gave me 50% ($750). Why? "I don't want women to feel like they'll be harassed when they ask for a restraining order". Asshole. He also didn't do that thing where she has to pay me. She moved, I don't know were. So she owes me $750 (in my mind $1500), I don't know where she is or how to contact her, and she's not paying. I have no recourse in the courts.

The kicker? She was a registered nurse and google showed her prior address, maybe 1/4 mile from me. Went over there, she'd done the same thing at that place. Explains the deputy's "oh, that's where she went" comment.

Do I need to say that absolutely nothing she claimed I did was true? Yeah, I though so. I was 100% the victim here, I did nothing to her.

Re:About time, overpaid lawyers

[DNS-and-BIND]

It's a collective punishment of all men. It has nothing to do with you personally, you're just a man and therefore guilty.