Re-understanding The Judge’s Artificial Reason

The modern social reality is becoming more and more complex.In order to meet the society’s expectation on the judiciary,judges need to have higher quality.Judge Coke creatively distinguished between natural reason and artificial reason.The judges must possess artificial reason in order to exercise judicial power independently.After that,"artificial reason" became the endorsement of professional judges.The concept of artificial reason gives the judiciary a reason to be independent from the interference of administrative power and other powers,and also defines the standard for the distinction between modern judges and traditional judges.The artificial reason contains the complex skills of the judge,which is the foundation of the judge’s power.At the same time it has rich connotation,we must treat the artificial reason seriously,avoid judicial mechanism and formalism.In Aristotle’s era,practical wisdom was the combination of virtue and reason.Today,however,the concept of artificial reason has lost its ethical connotation.The mainstream point of view in the academic circle of our country separates skills from ethics,only talks about skills rather than rationality,and advocates procedural professional ethics.Scholars’ theories inevitably affect the practice of judicial reform.Judging from the course of judicial reform,the construction of the team of judges has long emphasized the system and neglected the virtue.The latecomer intelligent court construction not only lacks the concept of virtue,but also develops the tool rationality of skill rationality to the extreme.However,justice is full virtue and lacks virtue,it is impossible to achieve true justice only by observing with "terms" and thinking with "procedures".At the same time,to exclude the judge’s virtue is to split the judge’s personality and degrade the judge’s dignity as a whole.The analytical idea of dichotomy between skill and ethics is not conducive to the cultivation of judge’s quality.We should put artificial reason under the framework of integrating skill and ethics,and unify the two in practical wisdom.Virtue is a kind of excellence,which brings things to a good state and enables people to perform activities brilliantly.Virtue can be divided into moral virtue and rational virtue.Practical wisdom belongs to practical rational virtue,so it naturally has two aspects of moral virtue and rational virtue.Solum was sufficiently concerned about the virtue of judges,and believed that judges should possess five judicial virtues: judicial temperance,judicial courage,judicial prudence,judicial intelligence and judicial wisdom.Human nature is a trend of development,and ultimately presents the result of natural attributes and acquired education.Therefore,we should guide and cultivate the moral character and judgment virtue of judges,especially attach importance to the role of system in shaping judge’s virtue,and form the conscience cycle between virtue and system.The selection system of judges has experienced a process from the single consideration of academic background and specialty to the gradual consideration of experience,but the content of virtue is still missing.Virtue or conscience is an essential quality for a judge.The judge’s moral quality should be examined in the selection process and the cultivation of professional ethics should be strengthened in the training.The system of case request is a means of judicial administration,which sets aside the subjective initiative of the judge,while the guiding case condenses the trial experience and judicial wisdom of the judge.From the system of request to the system of guiding case,the artificial reason of the judge is gradually recognized.