Compiled by Athena Smith.
Articles
Introducing ‘Posting Through the Singularity’
In the first installment of the “Posting Through the Singularity” column, Scott Shapiro explained that in this semi-regular series of essays, he will explore where artificial intelligence (AI) and law meet, with a particular focus on computational jurisprudence. Shapiro discussed how his lab at Yale Law School converted insurance regulations into formal logic so that a theorem prover could deduce the answers to an actuarial exam’s computational questions, rather than a language model predicting them.
The point is not that we found a better way to prompt a language model. The point, rather, is that we changed the kind of computation being performed. A language model predicts, and predictions aren’t good enough for legal compliance. A theorem prover, by contrast, deduces. And, once the regulations have been compiled into logic, there is no temperature setting, no prompt engineering, and no fortunate sampling. Either the conclusion follows from the rules or it does not.
The Insurrection Act Is No Exception to the Troops-at-Polls Ban
Loren Voss and Natalie Orpett argued that federal law under 18 U.S.C. § 592—which bars troops and armed men from places where elections are held unless necessary to repel armed enemies of the United States—is not overridden by the Insurrection Act, which authorizes the president to use the armed forces domestically. Voss and Orpett analyzed statutory text, canons of construction, and legislative history to illustrate that Congress intended the ban to constrain the president even where the Insurrection Act might otherwise apply, in order to prevent voter intimidation and protect the integrity of elections.
In other words, § 592 and the Insurrection Act are not inconsistent; neither statute suggests that the Insurrection Act’s grant of authority to the president can supersede § 592’s prohibition on armed people at the polls. The best reading is that although the Insurrection Act authorizes the president to act in limited circumstances, § 592 restrains the president from deploying armed personnel to polling locations. And a review of the historical context in which the statutes were passed supports that reading.
Podcasts
Lawfare Daily: Did Washington Walk Into Beijing’s Trap? Xi’s State Visit with Jonathan Czin: Julia Curlee sat down with Jonathan Czin to unpack Chinese President Xi Jinping’s state visit to Washington, his first in 11 years. The two discussed what each side walked away with, the implications for Taiwan and the war in Iran, and how the loss of China expertise and policy staff showed in the summit’s preparation and readouts.
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