June 25, 2025
By Bob Glaves | CBF Executive Director
On any given day in June 2025, you can read or hear that AI is turning our brains to mush, it is coming for our jobs, it could soon mean the end of humanity–or no, it could actually lead to our nirvana–and closer to home for this blog, it is the solution for access to justice.
There is more of this coming at us all the time, and it is a lot to take in with these allegedly existential stakes. Add in that all these broad pronouncements also carry a high bullsh*t quotient, and the default response for most of us (myself included) is to just tune it out and move on with our lives. But there is enough truth in each of these over-the-top statements that we should fight that urge to tune out, and some practical steps we can take to help cut through the noise and respond more constructively.
For each of the excessive statements I started this post with, I am going to briefly assess the level of threat or promise and assign a score of between one and four emojis to represent how fearful or excited we should be. I will follow with a few takeaways for each category, and then some broader suggestions for how us mortals can respond.
I am only going to briefly touch on the specific implications for access to justice and the practice of law at this point, as they will be the focus of an upcoming post, but wrestling with some of these larger questions will be a helpful foray into that discussion.
Is AI turning our brains to mush?
This one has some legs, I think. Just one look at the number of catatonic teens (and many adults, too) who we already see glued to their phones and the algorithms driving that trend should be our first warning sign.
With ChatGPT and other AI models making it easier and more tempting every day to offload our critical thinking skills, if we are not careful, it has the growing potential to reshape our brains in ways we are going to want back.
Critical thinking may be our most important currency in the legal profession, and as human beings generally, and it will become even more essential as we encounter whole new levels of fraud and fakery that AI and bad actors working with it are already starting to unleash.
This is not to say we should not be using AI at all, just to be thoughtful about how we go about it. There are many positive ways we can use AI to build on what we can otherwise do on our own. But we will do well to start with our own thinking and keep that front and center. In other words, don’t let AI do your thinking for you; use it to help organize your thoughts and expand on your thinking.
Is it coming for our jobs?
😨 😨
For most of us in the legal profession, it is unlikely that AI is coming for our jobs, but it definitely is coming for many of the everyday tasks we have long associated with the practice of law and the day-to-day functioning of the court system. It has already been acing law school and passing the bar exam, too, so it is not something to ignore.
That said, we should not freak out and overestimate the effects on the uniquely human qualities of good lawyers. And an article in the New York Times Magazine this past weekend is one of many that gives us good food for thought on the new opportunities that are likely to develop as a result of AI, as some of the old ways we have taken for granted go by the wayside.
So yes, some big changes are likely coming as a result of AI, but if we focus on the fundamentals of what good lawyers have always done, it could be a good thing.
Is it coming for humanity?
😨 1/2
Well, as a Midwest Senator famously said recently, we all are going to die. So, there’s that. But I think we would all agree we would prefer it be in the normal course of humanity (which has enough peril!) as opposed to AI taking over our lives.
The idea that AI actually could take over our lives, of course, sounds nuts, but there are enough unknown and potentially uncontrollable factors that many of the people leading the AI charge are sounding the alarm. Even Da Pope is weighing in!
A bigger question is what humanity should do about this more existential threat. Even trying to regulate the inner workings of these AI models is not realistic or effective, but requiring transparency, standards, and accountability are all things our elected officials should be making a much bigger priority right now.
Or is it actually going to take us to Nirvana?
😊
There is little doubt that AI has the potential to improve our professional and personal lives by making many repetitive and soul-crushing tasks of the practice of law and our daily lives a thing of the past. Mark Cuban is among those who think it may cause us to favor more human interaction again, which would be great. And it should soon hasten the end of the billable hour, a good thing for all concerned.
But with all the madness that AI is going to unleash even in the best of worlds, I am not buying the Nirvana idea.
Is it really going to solve access to justice?
😊😊
On its own, no way, and run away if you hear anyone suggesting it as a magic solution.
But there are so many ways it is going to help in getting us there—thus it gets two happy emojis here—and I’ll expound on that in August.
For now, a recent article by Margaret Hagan offers some good food for thought on the more nuanced ways AI can make a real difference and how we can help make that happen.
What Now?
Resist the Urge to Just Tune Out
As busy people, taking time out to learn more about how this might help us be more efficient and effective at some future time is not easy to do without outside pressure to do so.
Sure, I recently took a Waymo in San Francisco and lived to tell about it and have used chatbots to take care of routine tasks or resolve minor disputes. And we all are using it unconsciously in our day-to-day lives with web searches and other technology already built into our lives.
But like most of us, I have not really set aside any time to learn more about how this all actually works or can be used to our advantage to be more efficient and effective. And that leads to the next point.
Dabble in it with Guardrails
By setting aside a modest block of time every week, there are some great practical guides out there to learn more about how these AI models work and how they can help us use them effectively without putting ourselves at risk.
Axios just published a good column on this, and Mark Palmer of the Illinois Supreme Court Commission on Professionalism has some good tips for the practice of law. We can even hire an AI coach!
Always Lead with Our Uniquely Human Qualities
If we lean into the uniquely human qualities of good lawyers and good people, and always keep those front and center in the way we use AI, we have a fighting chance to make it a force for good and survive while we are at it.