Symposium Introduction: Artificial Intelligence, Real Attorneys, and the Art of Lawyering: Utilizing the Tools of AI to Enhance, not Inhibit, our Humanity

Authors

• Carli N. Conklin

Abstract

In recent years, legal academia has seen a proliferation of symposia and conferences focused on the interrelationship between the increasing prevalence and sophistication of artificial intelligence, and the opportunities and challenges AI provides for our work in legal teaching, legal research and writing, and the practice of law. Here at the University of Missouri Center for the Study of Dispute Resolution and Journal of Dispute Resolution, we could not help but think about the rise of artificial intelligence in the practice of law through a dispute resolution lens. More specifically, we became increasingly curious about the unfolding interplay between artificial intelligence and the tools of technology on the one hand, and the very human nature of lawyering that is such a prominent focus of our dispute resolution teaching and practice, on the other. We found ourselves asking, “What does it mean to be a ‘real’ attorney—one who practices the art of lawyering both ethically and well, with skill and knowledge, with emotion and reason, with insight and judgment—in a time of artificial intelligence? Can we utilize the tools of AI to enhance, not inhibit, the human skills that make successful lawyering not only an exercise in reasoned argumentation and rational decision-making, but also an expression of the complex and varied human interests, emotions, differences, needs, commonalities, conflicts, values, and aspirations that give rise to our disputes, large and small?”

Recommended Citation

Carli N. Conklin, Symposium Introduction: Artificial Intelligence, Real Attorneys, and the Art of Lawyering: Utilizing the Tools of AI to Enhance, not Inhibit, our Humanity, 2026 J. Disp. Resol. ()
Available at: https://scholarship.law.missouri.edu/jdr/vol2026/iss2/5