Natural language processing in CLIME, a multilingual legal advisory system

This paper describes clime, a web-based legal advisory system with a multilingual natural language interface. clime is a `proof-of-concept' system which answers queries relating to ship-building and ship-operating regulations. Its core knowledge source is a set of such regulations encoded as a conceptual domain model and a set of formalised legal inference rules. The system supports retrieval of regulations via the conceptual model, and assessment of the legality of a situation or activity on a ship according to the legal inference rules. The focus of this paper is on the natural language aspects of the system, which help the user to construct semantically complex queries using wysiwym technology, allow the system to produce extended and cohesive responses and explanations, and support the whole interaction through a hybrid synchronous/asynchronous dialogue structure. Multilinguality (English and French) is viewed simply as interface localisation: the core representations are lan...

• Type: Journal
• Year: 2008
• Where: NLE
• Authors: Roger Evans, Paul Piwek, Lynne J. Cahill, Neil Tipper
• Keywords: Clime, Legal Inference Rules, Natural Language, NLE 2008