Legal Software: Ph.D. student position in Computational Law, at University of Aberdeen

joi, 17 aprilie 2014

Ph.D. student position in Computational Law, at University of Aberdeen

A Ph.D. student research position regarding a Computational Law project at the University of Aberdeen has been posted.

The supervisor for the position is Dr. Adam Wyner .

Here are excerpts from the announcement:

Computational Law

Institution: Aberdeen University

Dept/School/Faculty: Graduate School, College of Physical Sciences

PhD Supervisor: Dr A Wyner

Co-Supervisor: Dr W Vasconcelos

Application Deadline: Applications accepted all year round

Funding Availability: PhD Funding Status Self-Funded PhD Students Only

Individuals, companies, and government organisations are governed by laws. Laws appear in legislation, regulations, and case law; advisors and lawyers work with clients to understand the laws, see that they comply, or resolve non-compliance. While it has generally been the case that there has been no computational analysis or implementation of laws, this has recently and dramatically changed. There are now many areas of the legal analysis that are open to computational techniques such as representation and reasoning with regulations in natural language, extraction of laws from legislation or regulations, compliance management tools, ontological representations, formal legal argumentation, social simulation, amongst others. The area looks to grow rapidly in the near future.

The PhD project will contribute to research on computational analysis of norms. A subtopic suitable to the student’s interests, skills, and ambitions will be selected. The research will address challenges within the subtopic and the methodology to address them. The results of the research ought to have broad application and impact.

The outcome of the project will be evaluated in terms of both performance and quality with comparisons to state-of-the-art systems.

During the project, student will also be supervised on the methodology of scientific research, experimenting, writing, presenting, team-working.

The successful applicant should have, or expect to have, an Honours Degree at 2.1 or above (or equivalent) in Computer Science. It is essential for student to have solid knowledge about one of the following disciplines of modern computer science and artificial intelligence: discrete mathematics, computational linguistics, knowledge-based systems, machine learning. It is important for the student to have basic understanding of modern database systems and distributed systems. The student should have good programming skills.

Funding Notes:

This project is advertised in relation to the research areas of the discipline of Computing Science. The successful applicant will be expected to provide the funding for Tuition fees, living expenses and maintenance. Details of the cost of study can be found by visiting http://www.abdn.ac.uk. There is normally NO funding attached to this project, however, if an exceptional candidate is offered a position then they may be considered for a tuition fee waiver. Normally, to be considered for a fee waiver, you need a first class undergraduate degree or a masters degree with commendation or distinction (or the international equivalent). [...]