critical thinking and the law

An article in ‘The Times’ of 29 October looks at the growth of AI in the field of law (‘Warning: the robots are coming’). The number of patents filed for ‘lawtech’ grew by 64% last year to a record figure of 1369. This growth has significant implications for both lawyers and their clients, In a survey conducted by ‘The Times’ for their Best Law Firms report, it was found that about half of lawyers thought that the use of AL will result in the need for fewer lawyers. However, as one senior lawyer pointed out, ‘Artificial intelligence is unlikely to be able to replace the need for critical thinking and problem-solving’. If this is the case, then critical thinking will, once again, be shown to be a set of skills that are very much needed.