An Introduction to Artificial Intelligence and Legal Reasoning: Using xTalk to Model the Alien Tort Claims Act and Torture Victim Protection Act

This paper presents an introduction to artificial intelligence for legal scholars and includes a computer program that determines the existence of jurisdiction, defences, and applicability of the Alien Tort Claims Act and Torture Victims Protection Act. The paper includes a discussion of the limits and implications of computer programming in formal representations of the law. Concluding that formalization of the law reveals implicit weaknesses in reductionist legal theories, this paper emphasizes the limitations in practice of such theories.