4 ms·

The only problems are it could be convincingly wrong about anything it tells you and isn't liable for its mistakes.

sonofaragorn 3y ago
What if they were liable? Say the company that offers the LLM lawyer is liable. Would that make this feasible? In terms of being convincingly wrong, it's not like lawyers never make mistakes...
- giantg2 3y ago
  "What if they were liable?" They'd be sued out of existence. "In terms of being convincingly wrong, it's not like lawyers never make mistakes..." They have malpractice insurance, they can potentially defend their position if later sued, and most importantly they have the benefit of appeal to authority image/perception.
  - AnimalMuppet 3y ago
    All right, what if legal GPTs had to carry malpractice insurance? Either they give good advice, or the insurance rates will drive them out of business. I guess you'd have to have some way of knowing that the "malpractice insurance ID" that the GPT gave you at the start of the session was in fact valid, and with an insurance company that had the resources to actually cover if needed...
    - kulikalov 3y ago
      It's funny how any conversation ends with this question unanswered.
      - YetAnotherNick 3y ago
        Weirdly HN is full of anti AI people who just refuses to discuss the point that is being discussed and goes into all the same argument of wrong answer that they got some time. And then they present anecdotal evidence as truth, while there is no clear evidence if AI lawyer has more or less chance to be wrong than human. Surely AI could remember more and has been shown to clear bar examination.
        giantg2 3y ago
        "while there is no clear evidence if AI lawyer has more or less chance to be wrong than human." In the tests they are shown to be pretty close. The point I made wasn't about more mistakes, but about other factors influencing liability and how it would be worse for AI than humans at this point.
        YetAnotherNick 3y ago
        > at this point. This is the key point. Even if assume the AI won't get better, the liability and insurance premiums will likely become similar in very near future. There is a clear business opportunity that's there in insuring AI lawyer.
- naniwaduni 3y ago
  You'd require them to carry liability insurance (this is usually true for meat lawyers as well), which basically punts the problem up to "how good do they have to be to convince an insurer to offer them an appropriate amount of insurance at a price that leaves the service economically viable?"
  - kulikalov 3y ago
    Given orders of magnitude better cost efficiency, they will have plenty of funds to lure in any insurance firm in existence. And then replace insurance firms too.
engineer_22 3y ago
This is an area for further development and thought... If a LLM can pass the bar, and has a corpus of legal work instantly accessible, what prevents the deployment of the LLM (or other AI structure) to provide legitimate legal services? If the AI is providing legal services, how do we assign responsibility for the work (to the AI, or to its owner)? How to insure the work for Errors and Omissions? More practically, if willing to take on responsibility for yourself, is the use of AI going to save you money?
- AnimalMuppet 3y ago
  A human that screws up either too often or too spectacularly can be disbarred, even if they passed the bar. They can also be sued. If a GPT screws up, it could in theory be disbarred. But you can't sue it for damages, and you can't tell whether the same model under a different name is the next legal GPT you consult.
  - engineer_22 3y ago
    Agreed - which is why this is an area that needs more thought and development
- nprateem 3y ago
  Re your first point: it's not conscious. It has no understanding. It's perfectly possible the model could successfully answer an exam question but fail to reach the same or similar conclusion when it has to reason it's own way there based on information provided.
  - mvdtnz 3y ago
    Careful, there are plenty of True Believers on this website who really think that these "guess the next word" machines really do have consciousness and understanding.
    - lewhoo 3y ago
      I incline towards you on the subject but if you call it guessing you open yourself up to all sorts of rebuttals.
boplicity 3y ago
The obvious intermediate step is that you add an actual expert into the workflow, in terms of using LLMs for this purpose. Basically, add a "validate" step. So, you'd first chat with the LLM, create conclusions, then vet those conclusions with an expert specially trained to be skeptical of LLM generated content. I would be shocked if there aren't law agencies that aren't already doing something exactly like this.
- freejazz 3y ago
  Ah, so have the lawyer do everything the GPT did so the lawyer can be sure the GPT didn't fuck up.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

What if they were liable? Say the company that offers the LLM lawyer is liable. Would that make this feasible? In terms of being convincingly wrong, it's not like lawyers never make mistakes...

giantg2 3y ago
"What if they were liable?" They'd be sued out of existence. "In terms of being convincingly wrong, it's not like lawyers never make mistakes..." They have malpractice insurance, they can potentially defend their position if later sued, and most importantly they have the benefit of appeal to authority image/perception.
- AnimalMuppet 3y ago
  All right, what if legal GPTs had to carry malpractice insurance? Either they give good advice, or the insurance rates will drive them out of business. I guess you'd have to have some way of knowing that the "malpractice insurance ID" that the GPT gave you at the start of the session was in fact valid, and with an insurance company that had the resources to actually cover if needed...
  - kulikalov 3y ago
    It's funny how any conversation ends with this question unanswered.
    - YetAnotherNick 3y ago
      Weirdly HN is full of anti AI people who just refuses to discuss the point that is being discussed and goes into all the same argument of wrong answer that they got some time. And then they present anecdotal evidence as truth, while there is no clear evidence if AI lawyer has more or less chance to be wrong than human. Surely AI could remember more and has been shown to clear bar examination.
      - giantg2 3y ago
        "while there is no clear evidence if AI lawyer has more or less chance to be wrong than human." In the tests they are shown to be pretty close. The point I made wasn't about more mistakes, but about other factors influencing liability and how it would be worse for AI than humans at this point.
        YetAnotherNick 3y ago
        > at this point. This is the key point. Even if assume the AI won't get better, the liability and insurance premiums will likely become similar in very near future. There is a clear business opportunity that's there in insuring AI lawyer.
naniwaduni 3y ago
You'd require them to carry liability insurance (this is usually true for meat lawyers as well), which basically punts the problem up to "how good do they have to be to convince an insurer to offer them an appropriate amount of insurance at a price that leaves the service economically viable?"
- kulikalov 3y ago
  Given orders of magnitude better cost efficiency, they will have plenty of funds to lure in any insurance firm in existence. And then replace insurance firms too.

engineer_22 3y ago

This is an area for further development and thought... If a LLM can pass the bar, and has a corpus of legal work instantly accessible, what prevents the deployment of the LLM (or other AI structure) to provide legitimate legal services? If the AI is providing legal services, how do we assign responsibility for the work (to the AI, or to its owner)? How to insure the work for Errors and Omissions? More practically, if willing to take on responsibility for yourself, is the use of AI going to save you money?

AnimalMuppet 3y ago
A human that screws up either too often or too spectacularly can be disbarred, even if they passed the bar. They can also be sued. If a GPT screws up, it could in theory be disbarred. But you can't sue it for damages, and you can't tell whether the same model under a different name is the next legal GPT you consult.
- engineer_22 3y ago
  Agreed - which is why this is an area that needs more thought and development
nprateem 3y ago
Re your first point: it's not conscious. It has no understanding. It's perfectly possible the model could successfully answer an exam question but fail to reach the same or similar conclusion when it has to reason it's own way there based on information provided.
- mvdtnz 3y ago
  Careful, there are plenty of True Believers on this website who really think that these "guess the next word" machines really do have consciousness and understanding.
  - lewhoo 3y ago
    I incline towards you on the subject but if you call it guessing you open yourself up to all sorts of rebuttals.

boplicity 3y ago

The obvious intermediate step is that you add an actual expert into the workflow, in terms of using LLMs for this purpose. Basically, add a "validate" step. So, you'd first chat with the LLM, create conclusions, then vet those conclusions with an expert specially trained to be skeptical of LLM generated content. I would be shocked if there aren't law agencies that aren't already doing something exactly like this.

freejazz 3y ago
Ah, so have the lawyer do everything the GPT did so the lawyer can be sure the GPT didn't fuck up.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]