A few days ago I posted on WSJ and NYT articles talking about the opening of new law schools in the midst of a crash in law student applications. Since then, a couple of other professors have posted comments on the topic, and I thought I’d flag them. NYU law professor Robert Howse, writing at […]
Author Archive | Kenneth Anderson
More New Law Schools Opening
By Kenneth Anderson on February 1, 2013 2:49 pm in Academia, Law School Tuition and Loans, Law Schools
Coming on top of news of the sharp declines in law school applications, the Wall Street Journal reports today on new law schools opening. The headline captures it: “A Crop of New Law Schools Opens Amid a Lawyer Glut.” Jennifer Smith reports that thought law school applications are at “their lowest in a decade,” a […]
The Uncanny Valley – The Original Human-Robot Psychology Essay by Masahiro Mori
VC readers, being eclectic polymaths, are likely to heard of the “Uncanny Valley” – the hypothesis advanced by roboticist Masahiro Mori that a “person’s response to a humanlike robot would abruptly shift from empathy to revulsion as it approached, but failed to attain, a lifelike appearance. This descent into eeriness is known as the uncanny valley.” Mori’s […]
Law and Robots Conference Call for Papers, and a Link to a Video From HRW’s Tom Malinowski Which, Though I am Not Persuaded, Will Always Treasure
The “Law and Robotics Conference” will take place on April 8-9, 2013, at Stanford Law School (it follows on the highly successful law and robotics conference that took place at University of Miami last year). Conference organizers are seeking proposals to present conference papers – I should have posted this a while ago – and […]
An “Ethical Turing Test”? More on Comparing Self-Driving Vehicles and Autonomous Weapon Systems
In my earlier posts comparing self-driving cars and autonomous weapon systems, I pointed out that in neither case are we seeing a sudden, systemic paradigm change, a shift from one whole technological system to another. Not, at least, in the sense that I had long assumed – that a change-over to driverless cars would require […]
(Updated) The Incremental Progress of Self-Driving Cars and Current Safety Systems
I’m continuing my series of posts on automated vehicles (the last one was some initial thoughts on comparisons between self-driving cars and autonomous weapon systems). Today I want to recommend this January 12, 2013 NYT story, by John Markoff and Somini Sengupta, on the current state of safety systems for cars in the incremental advance […]
White House Says We Won’t Build the Death Star
By Kenneth Anderson on January 12, 2013 7:41 am in Popular Culture, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Space Law
The Obama White House knew, of course, that creating a web-based system for ordinary citizens to call on the government to do something, and promising a response if 25,000 people or more sign an online petition within 30 days, would inevitably produce some silliness. There’s a reason we’re not a direct democracy, no matter how […]
What’s the Business Model for Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs)? And What Does Online Education Strategically Mean for the Long-Run Rent Structure of Higher Education? Is this Truly Disruptive?
Melissa Korn and Jennifer Levitz ask a good question in a news article about so-called “Massive Open Online Courses” in today’s Wall Street Journal: what’s the business model? How do they generate revenues? There is a lot of discussion about how online education is going to shake up the cosseted business models of today’s brick […]
Legal Infrastructure for Driverless Cars, and Comparisons Between the Law and Ethics of Self-Driving Cars and Autonomous Weapon Systems
(Thanks Instapundit for the link.) Driverless cars are coming faster than most observers would have thought. One big reason, according to Bryant Walker Smith in a recent article in Slate, is that people predicting the driverless car future assumed that they would have to be part of centrally-run systems, with corresponding changes to physical infrastructure, […]
The Just-in-Case Loan Acceleration Clause, Ultimate Version
Handy if representing creditors in case of the end of the world (Bainbridge via Leiter via Schewel via persons unknown): 12.7 END OF WORLD. In the event that the world as known to mankind shall come to an end, whether through natural forces (including, without limitation, plague, drought, earthquakes, hurricanes, and floods), manmade forces (including, […]
The Law of the Digitus Impudicus
Further to the Chief Conspirator’s post about the Christmas “middle finger,” I point readers interested in the law and history of this remarkably long-standing gesture to the definitive law review article on the subject, “Digitus Impudicus: The Middle Finger and the Law,” by my esteemed colleague at Washington College of Law, Ira Robbins. It’s a […]
How’s the FAA Coming on Integrating Domestic Drones into US Airspace?
Though much of my attention goes to military drones used outside the US, the regulatory issues surrounding US domestic drones are vital and difficult. Domestic drones of many types, sizes, and functions will become an increasingly important part of US aviation over time, and the issues are thorny. Lawyer types like me tend to focus […]
Co-Conspirator Todd Zywicki on David Skeel on Dodd-Frank
Bankruptcy and finance law scholar David Skeel’s book, The New Financial Deal: Understanding Dodd-Frank and Its (Unintended) Consequences, appeared in late 2010 and remains one of the best general books for understanding the main themes of this massive legislation intended to reform financial services. I’ve read it closely several times (especially when I need to […]
Showcase Campuses, Built With IOUs
The title of the post is drawn from today’s front-page NYT article by Andrew Martin, subtitled “Degrees of debt, a reckoning for colleges.” It’s the sixth part in a sobering series on college costs and debt – earlier articles mostly focused on the personal debt taken on by students and their parents, while this one […]
Autonomous Weapon Systems and Their Regulation – A Flurry of Activity
I’ve written in the past about debates over autonomous weapon systems – their legality and morality, ways to review proposed or emerging systems to ensure their conformity to the laws of war, and the general problem of how to regulate weapons technologies with both enormous promises of benefits but also significant risks of harm, where […]