Skip to main content
Artificial justice
ANSELM ELDERGILL asks whether artificial intelligence may decide legal cases in the future, in place of human judges, and how AI could reshape the legal landscape
MORE QUESTIONS THAN ANSWERS: AI Truth Machine / LIT Law Lab, Johannes Kepler University (AT) [Ars Electronica/flickr/CC]

OUR courts are in crisis: buildings are crumbling; serious delays are endemic; legal rules are labyrinthine; very few citizens without means are eligible for legal aid; and the judiciary in dress and thought is old-fashioned and hierarchical, its often ill-judged attempts at self-reform and modernity distorted by long-entrenched class privilege.

Is artificial intelligence part of the answer to these and other pressing legal problems or part of a dystopian future?

In Samuel Butler’s 19th century novel Erewhon, the citizens of his imaginary country were concerned that evolution in humans is gradual but in mechanics rapid, concluding that machines would soon surpass and supplant them.

The 95th Anniversary Appeal
Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
Similar stories
BRAVE BNEW WORLD? Keir Starmer at the London Tech Week conference at London's Olympia, where he announced the TechFirst programme for secondary school pupils to be taught skills in artificial intelligence (AI) as part of a drive to put the technological power
Features / 4 April 2026
4 April 2026

In the second and final part of his article MIKE SCOTT posits that if we don’t control AI while we’ve got the chance, we could be signing the death warrant for our children and grandchildren

8computerdata
Features / 2 October 2025
2 October 2025

Digital ID means the government could track anyone and then limit their speech, movements, finances — and it could get this all wrong, identifying the wrong people for the wrong reasons, as the numerous digital cockups so far demonstrate, warns DYLAN MURPHY

COST CONTROL MODE: Health Secretary Wes Streeting during a visit to NHS National Operations Centre in London on July 25 2025
Features / 18 September 2025
18 September 2025

Politicians who continue to welcome contracts with US companies without considering the risks and consequences of total dependency in the years to come are undermining the raison d’etre of the NHS, argues Dr JOHN PUNTIS

The House of Lords
Features / 21 August 2025
21 August 2025

Mental health fears push Peers to change law on IPP torture sentences, reports Charley Allan