What Are You Going to Do With Unlimited Reasoning Resources?

After four intense hours teaching legal prompting to law students this week at UPF, I ended the class with a question that hung heavy in the air: What are you going to do with unlimited reasoning resources? The silence that followed was deafening.

Last month, I explored how AI is disrupting legal practice through the lens of Clayton Christensen's Innovator's Dilemma. But what I'm witnessing now reveals an even more subtle transformation of our profession.

The journey typically starts innocently enough. Lawyers learn to craft prompts for AI systems, iterating and refining their approach to solve complex legal problems. This process initially enhances our problem-solving abilities—we think deeply about how to structure issues, what context to provide, and how to extract the most valuable insights from AI systems.

Yet, there's a concerning trajectory that I see emerging through my work with multiple legal AIs and my experience mentoring cutting-edge legaltech startups. The arrival of pre-prompting—prompts already made and available with a mouse click—is just the beginning. These pre-made prompts are the precursors of AI agents that will automate much of our reasoning processes, transforming legal work into a kind of "click and get" reasoning: select the appropriate template, input the specific details, and receive the analysis. While we won't be completely passive in this process, we'll no longer actively think about how to break down and tackle the problem. The mental exercise of structuring legal problems, once a cornerstone of legal reasoning, will gradually fade into the background.

While AI cannot formally practice law—it can't pass the bar or hold professional credentials—it's finding an indirect path to legal practice through human lawyers who increasingly serve as its credentialed interface. This "credential interface" is rapidly evolving into what I call a "credential arbitrage," where lawyers primarily provide the legally required human oversight and certification, while AI systems handle more of the analytical heavy lifting.

This shift in roles signifies a profound change in how legal services are delivered, highlighting the inevitable progression towards a more AI-integrated legal profession.

The Inevitable Progression

Let's be honest: this transformation is inevitable for two fundamental reasons. First, it aligns with human nature. Given the choice between developing our own complex prompts and using pre-made solutions, most will gravitate toward the easier path. I recently experienced this firsthand while mentoring a legal tech startup. When I expressed concerns about their pre-made prompting solutions potentially diminishing lawyers' reasoning capabilities, their response was telling: "Pre-made prompts are great for sales. People love them." It's not a criticism; it's simply how we operate as humans.

Second, market forces will accelerate this transition. Clients will naturally prefer faster, AI-augmented services at potentially lower costs. Law firms facing competitive pressures will adopt these technologies not just for efficiency but for survival. While the analysis might be increasingly AI-driven, it will still require our professional supervision and final sign-off—creating that credential arbitrage I mentioned earlier.

The Evolution of Legal Practice: A Look into the Future

How will this reshape the day-to-day reality of legal practice? Here's my projection:

3 Years From Now

Lawyers will primarily function as AI-assisted professionals with human oversight. Our mornings will begin with reviewing AI-analyzed contracts and documents, using sophisticated prompts to generate legal research and initial drafts. While client meetings remain personal, they'll be heavily informed by AI-generated insights. Our value will increasingly lie in validating AI outputs and making final judgment calls.

5 Years From Now

We'll evolve into "AI orchestrators," managing multiple specialized AI systems for different aspects of legal practice—contract analysis, litigation strategy, regulatory compliance. Our role will focus on validation, relationship management, and strategic oversight. Most routine legal analysis will be AI-driven (most probably through AI agents that will automate processes), with lawyers focusing on review and decision-making rather than initial analysis.

10 Years From Now

Lawyers will primarily serve as the critical "AI-human interface." Our days will center on:

• Providing final approval on AI-generated work
• Managing client relationships
• Making ethical decisions
• Interfacing with courts and institutions
• Taking legal responsibility for decisions
• Managing complex risk scenarios

The Question That Remains

So, I return to the question I posed to my students: What are you going to do with unlimited reasoning resources?

As I watched their faces process this question, I realized it encapsulates the central challenge of our profession's future. While AI cannot replace the human elements of lawyering—building trust, exercising judgment in complex ethical situations, understanding unstated client needs, taking personal responsibility—it's reshaping the intellectual core of our profession.

Are we witnessing the end of legal reasoning as we know it? Or are we seeing its evolution into something new—a hybrid form where human judgment and AI capabilities combine to create something greater than the sum of its parts?

In my next article, I'll explore another dimension of this transformation: how it's reshaping the economic dynamics of legal practice and who captures the value we create. But for now, I leave you with the same silence-inducing question I posed to my students: What are YOU going to do with unlimited reasoning resources?

#LegalTech #ArtificialIntelligence #LawPractice #FutureOfLaw #LegalInnovation