Ilan Barzilay Quoted in Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly: Silicon Valley Study Pegs Lawyers as ‘Most Worried’ About AI

According to DevRev, a Silicon Valley tech firm, American lawyers are more worried about advancements in AI than those in any other profession. Their research indicates that lawyers in Massachusetts have higher levels of anxiety over AI than other professions, followed by artists, doctors, accountants, and data analysts.

Attorneys who are naturally skeptical toward new technology may be inclined to take DevRev’s conclusions with more than a grain of salt. But Pierce Atwood attorney Ilan Barzilay, co-chair of the firm’s AI and Machine Learning practice, takes “a more sanguine view of the coming AI storm.”

Ilan believes that DevRev’s findings about AI anxiety among lawyers ring true — to a point. “Certainly, there’s some [concern],” Barzilay says. “Attorneys can feel these things hanging over their shoulder. Law firms and companies are certainly paying attention to this. My firm certainly is.”

Ilan has noticed more “nervousness” among lawyers given the recent development of ChatGPT and the growing prevalence of generative AI, but views it as a natural human response to new technology.

“New technologies always invoke a certain amount of anxiety in fields where they are likely to be disruptive,” he says. “Machine learning and AI are no different, only now, these new technologies are threatening the knowledge-based and creative industries — areas we had thought of as being more protected from ‘takeover by the machines’ because of their human touch.”

As machines become smarter, lawyers, like everyone else, are going to have to learn to adapt. “These [technologies] have developed from very rudimentary tools to entities that replicate human thought and creative ability to levels and at a pace previously only found in science fiction,” he says. “We’re here. And what it looks like in 15 years compared to what it looks like now is going to be very different.”

The complete article by Pat Murphy can be found in the January 19, 2024 issue of Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly.