Industry publications and blogs make it sound like just a matter of time before all attorneys are replaced by robots or software programs, and artificial intelligence will run practices, handle cases and argue the law in front of juries. Consider IBM’s Watson. According to IBM, Watson is “a technology platform that uses natural language processing and machine learning to reveal insights from large amounts of unstructured data.”
Feasibility Index: 1 out of 5
Realistically, robots won’t replace lawyers in 2016, or for years to come. While Google’s DeepMind AI can beat some Atari games, that’s a long way from mastering closing arguments. There is still the importance of intellectual capacity to understand and debate the law. However, law firms are now harnessing the power of predictive analytics to analyze cases before accepting them to determine if they can be won, how much they will cost and other factors. Predictive analytics have definitely become mainstream and their influence will continue to grow in 2016.
