Cardozo School of Law: Conference
Dates: January 28-29, 2007.
Venue: Cardozo Law School, Yeshiva University, 55 Fifth Avenue (5th Ave.
& 12th St.), New York (Manhattan), New York
Description of conference:
One of the largest problems faced by criminal investigators, litigators, paralegals, triers of fact, and others interested in disputes about factual questions in legal settings is the sheer mass of evidence available. It is often difficult to remember, retrieve, and interpret voluminous evidential information, and important relationships and inconsistencies may go unnoticed as a result. Tools that support the storage, retrieval, and interpretation of large masses of evidence would therefore be of great use.
Psychological studies have shown that people's ability to remember, retrieve,
and interpret information is greatly enhanced when they organize it in a
way that is meaningful to them. Scholars of the law of evidence have long
suggested that graphical representations of evidential arguments and inferences
could help people make sense of masses of evidence. As early as 1913, John
Henry Wigmore claimed that his charting method promotes rational thinking
about legal evidence. Wigmore had only pencil and paper to draw his cumbersome
graphs. Today computer software may make it possible for almost anyone to
construct useful graphical representations of arguments and inferences related
to large collections of evidence. If such software were combined with with
existing database, document management, and search technology, documentary
evidence could be stored and retrieved in accordance with the user's view
of a case. This would facilitate the transfer of a case file from one person
to another because it would make it easier for recipients of files to grasp
the signficance of the evidentiary details of a case.
Software for graphical representation of evidential argument is currently
being investigated for use in various domains. Argument visualization software
has been designed, for instance, to support the teaching of scientific reasoning
and critical thinking skills (e.g., Belvedere, Reasonable, Araucaria, Convince
Me), to support intelligence analysis, and to facilitate individual or collaborative
problem solving (e.g., Questmap, SEAS). Moreover, current artificial intelligence
research offers precise accounts of evidential reasoning and thus provides
a clear semantics of graphical notations as well as computational methods.
In the legal domain, fact investigators and litigators increasingly use software that supports the storage and retrieval of information in terms of conceptual and relational networks (e.g., Holmes 2, Analyst's Notebook). As yet, however, as yet, such tools offer little or no support for structuring thinking about information: existing software allows users to store evidentiary data in terms of events, objects, actors, and the relations among these things, but it does not allow users to represent how such data support or undermine factual hypotheses.
This interdisciplinary conference brings together scholars and practitioners from fields such as law, philosophy, computer science, artificial intelligence, cognitive psychology, and linguistics. The following topics and issues will be addressed:
- New and current graphical means for visualization of factual inference
and proof.
- Semantics of graphical notations: what are the underlying theories of
evidential reasoning, including jurisprudential, philosophical, psychological,
rhetorical, logical, and mathematical theories?
- Software tools that are currently available or under development for
graphical representation of factual inference and proof.
- Potential contexts for the use of such software (e.g., criminal
investigation, intelligence analysis, trials, and law teaching).
- Can graphical representation of evidential argument support automatic
evaluation of hypotheses?
- How can current insights into human-computer interactuions be exploited
to increase the usefulness of such software; e.g., how can visual complexity
generated by large masses of evidence be managed?
- Are there pertinent empirical studies and findings about real-world
use of evidence-charting methods in legal and other contexts?
