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HELIC-II: Legal reasoning system on the parallel inference machine

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Abstract

This paper presents HELIC-II, a legal reasoning system on the parallel inference machine. HELIC-II draws legal conclusions for a given case by referring to a statutory law (legal rules) and judicial precedents (old cases). This system consists of two inference engines. The rule-based engine draws legal consequences logically by using legal rules. The case-based engine generates legal concepts by referencing similar old cases. These engines complementally draw all possible conclusions, and output them in the form of inference trees. Users can use these trees as material to construct arguments in a legal suit.

HELIC-II is implemented on the parallel inference machine, and it can draw conclusions quickly by parallel inference.

As an example, a legal inference system for the Penal Code is introduced, and the effectiveness of the legal reasoning and parallel inference model is shown.

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Katsumi Nitta: He received B. Sc., M. Sc. and Ph. D in 1975, 1977 and 1980, from Tokyo Institute of Technology. Since 1980 he has been a computer scientist at Electrotechnical Laboratory, and he has conducted the research of knowledge processing based on logic programming. He has developed a computational model of the parallel logic programming language, a Concurrent Prolog, and a consultation system of the Patent law. He was awarded the dissertation prize in 1988 for his research on the knowledge representation for the Patent law from the Information Processing Society of Japan. He passed the patent attorney examination in 1988. Since 1989, he has worked for Institute for New Generation Computer Technology (ICOT). He has engaged in the parallel application systems such as legal reasoning and genome analysis. He is presently the manager of the second research department of ICOT.

Yoshihisa Ohtake: Senior Researcher of ICOT. He has been a researcher at TOSHIBA Research & Development Center from 1984 to 1989. In the years 1984–1989 he developed high level programming language and planning system for assembly robot, and program synthesis system for programmable controller. He transfered to ICOT from 1989 to 1993. In the years 1989–1990 he studied parallel CAD and developed a parallel router. In the years 1991–1993 he studied legal reasoning and a member of development team for HELIC-II. He received bachelor’s degree and master’s degree from Kyoto University in 1982 and 1984 respectively.

Shigeru Maeda: Since 1987 he is Research Engineer of the Artificial Intelligence Group in the Information Systems Engineering Laboratory, Toshiba Corporation, develpoed Expert Systems for analytic domain and Expert System Tool. When he belonged to ICOT from 1989 to 1992, research and development work includes Expert Systems for synthetic domain, Case-Based Reasoning, Analogical Reasoning and Machine Learning. He received bachelor’s and master’s degree from Hokkaido University in 1985 and 1987 respectively.

Masayuki Ono: Researcher of the Computer Aided Design Administration Department in the OKI Electric Industry Co., Ltd. He took a great interest in Design intelligent system. Since dispatching to the ICOT in 1989, he has develpoed and researched cooperative reasoning in Design and case-based reasoning in Legal. He returned his company in 1992. He received bachelor’s degree from Sophia University in 1985.

Hiroshi Ohsaki: He received bachelor’s degree from Aoyama University of chemical science in 1967. He was System Engineer in the JIPDEC Development and Research Office since 1985. From 1985 to 1987, he developed and designed network management system and network application program. In 1988, he developed knowledge acquisition system EPSILON. From 1989 to 1990, he developed cooperative knowledge-based system FREEDOM. Currently he developed legal reasoning system HELIC-II. His current interests are knowledge representation of legal domain, case-based reasoning, parallel inference.

Kiyokazu Sakane: He received M. Eng. degree in electrical and electronic engineering in 1983 from Kyoto University. After that, he joined to Nippon Steel Corp. He is since 1991 manager of Software Technology Center, Electronics & Information Systems Div., Nippon Steel Corp. He has developed process control systems, utilizing case based reasoning and modern control technologies. In the years 1987–1991 he wroked for ICOT. He researched qualitative reasoning and causal reasoning. He studied constraint solving problems in developing causal reasoning system. He also worked with deductive reasoning system based on theorem prover, MGTP. He developed deductive rasoning subsystem of legal reasoning system, HELIC-II.

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Nitta, K., Ohtake, Y., Maeda, S. et al. HELIC-II: Legal reasoning system on the parallel inference machine. New Gener Comput 11, 423–448 (1993). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03037186

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03037186

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