IN A WORLD OF CATCHY AI LAWYERS,
It Pays to Be the Trusted Discussion Group Leader
By Jonathan J. O’ Konek
When you first went to law school, if you were anything like me, you probably thought you were going to a school where you would learn something called“ the law.” And this“ law” was simply a fixed set of fancy words and phrases – many of which were in Latin – that you could learn and apply to any given situation. It would be like acting, or so I thought, with my job as a lawyer amounting to memorizing legal“ lines” and then reciting them in a courtroom. However, once I graduated from law school, and started practicing law, I quickly realized: 1) I did not“ know the law,” and 2) there really was no such thing as“ knowing the law.”
That is because when lawyers begin practicing, we recognize we will only ever really learn a small subset of a certain legal discipline, whether it be in topics like criminal law, family law, or oil and gas law. The longer we practice, the more we learn we only become true“ masters” of an even smaller subset of legal disciplines like“ federal criminal law,”“ North Dakota family law,” or even something as specialized as“ pore space law.” Consequently, good lawyers know when they do not know the intricacies of a certain legal issue. And, when they meet with an individual who has a case outside their legal discipline, they either decline to represent the individual or refer them to a lawyer who does.
“ The Law” Represents a Broad Language, Not Narrow Statements
In fact, being a lawyer is a lot like being a librarian. Just like how a librarian will never read every book in his or her library, a lawyer will under no circumstances research the entire“ law” in their discipline. Instead, like librarians, lawyers learn a system for how to find the right books in their“ library.” For librarians, it is a catalog process like the Dewey Decimal System, and for lawyers, it is an elemental language where we apply certain facts to certain laws.
However, just like how I was mistaken prior to law school, most laypeople assume lawyers“ know the law.” And many of them want quick, certain answers made with confidence and that contain impressive legal buzzwords. Moreover, for many people, a confident wrong answer is often more appealing than a hesitant right answer. Yet, good lawyers know, in legal practice, there are rarely quick and certain answers. So, we analyze things such as practical or legal challenges, identify possible outcomes, and often caveat any advice we give with the quintessential lawyer phrase,“ it depends.” While this type of advice worked in years past, in 2026, the legal field has changed because of two simple words, artificial intelligence( AI).
Artificial Intelligence Offers People False Legal Confidence
Many talented people have written articles, columns, and even treatises about AI, predicting how it will affect the legal field. While it may be amusing to make these predictions( for what it’ s worth, my vote is that our experience with AI will be similar to the“ Outer Limits” episode“ The Haven”), there is a practical consideration that lawyers in North Dakota should consider. Namely, with AI, people can now find those quick and certain legal answers without ever speaking to a lawyer.
Unsurprisingly, these answers are often wrong for many reasons; for example, because they contain inapplicable, misapplied, or even fabricated law. In many ways, today’ s AI is a classic example of the Dunning-Kruger Effect, whereby, due to its programming, AI overestimates its legal knowledge even though it lacks the ability to correctly apply it. Yet, laypeople often do not understand the nuances of the legal system, so our profession is seeing a greater number of people use AI – with its certain answers – as their lawyers.
In fact, AI has been front and center in the legal news world. You have likely read stories about lawyers who submitted pleadings that AI created which contained made up case law. Conversely, there have been stories about how pro se litigants have used AI to draft convincing, and successful, legal filings. Finally, there have been stories about how AI will replace lawyers.
AI Cannot Replace a Discussion Group Leader
Whether people use AI to submit pro se legal filings or to compile talking points when they appear in court, we owe it to the legal profession to combat this wave of certain, yet flawed, AI-generated legal answers by returning to the roots of our profession and becoming
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