Legal Matters

I have been reading about it, and have experimented with it, enough to share my early thoughts.

• AI as we currently know it is not going to replace lawyers. Computers did not replace lawyers. The Internet did not replace lawyers. No combination of online legal services or any other sites have replaced lawyers so far.

• We are a long way away from artificial intelligence developingemotional intelligence and flexibility

• AI needs to grow and develop considerably before it will even be a useful tool for lawyers. Time estimates in this area are risky but we're talking years not months.

• It will take time beyond that that AI in the legal sphere to be useful as a tool for nonlawyers

• Even when AI grows to the point where it can tell us what the law is with some reliability, it might

• one of the weaknesses of AI as it currently functions is that it has a tendency to want to give an answer even if that answer is incorrect or approximate. Lawyers will be the most skilled at spotting those flawed responses – we develop a “smell test” sensibility that often helps us know roughly what an answer ought to be before we ask the question.

• In five to 10 years, I can see a new generation of lawyers coming up who have grown up exposed to AI, and who can manipulate it skillfully. As happened when online legal research became popular,lawyers will develop new skills and fulfill new functions. They will be “repurposed”.

• Existing lawyers will learn to adapt, just as we adapted to online legal research.

• Bottom line, what the best lawyers have to sell is wisdom and sound judgment and there will always be a need for that.

My colleagues at Weilers LLPand I will continue to grow our knowledge of artificial intelligence, but to serve you with actual intelligence. If that sounds like the legal service you require, give us a call.

I talked to Canadian comedian Gerry Dee by phone recently from Toronto about his upcoming show in Thunder Bay May 5th at the TBCA.

It’s exciting you are coming to Thunder Bay with yourcomedy show.You have been here before in 2011?

“I’m not sure if I have been there since then. It’s great to be back!”

I enjoyed watching yourprevious show MrD on CBC. You even had some family members on the show?

“The show was a lot of fun to do. It slowly evolved that we cast some of my family members. My older daughter turned out to be a natural I guess. My middle daughter, we kinda gave her a line and that just evolved. My son got involved late in the show. I like to call it pure nepotism. My older daughter played Amanda Susan Sullivan.”