Reflections on Human Judgment in the Age of Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence is changing the way professionals work, but it has not changed why clients seek professional advice. This essay explores the nature of human judgment and why experience, independence, timing, and accountability remain the qualities that no technology can replace.

Every day, individuals and businesses retain lawyers, appoint arbitrators, engage mediators, and hire expert witnesses because they are seeking judgment. Curiously, very few people ever stop to ask what judgment actually is. We know it has value. We know when we trust it. We certainly recognize when it is absent. Yet defining it is surprisingly difficult.

That question has become increasingly important as artificial intelligence finds its way into virtually every profession. AI now summarizes documents, organizes information, identifies patterns, improves writing, and accelerates research in ways that would have seemed unimaginable only a few years ago. I use it almost every day, and I have no hesitation in saying that it has become one of the most remarkable professional tools developed during my career. The more I have incorporated it into my work, however, the more convinced I have become that its greatest contribution may not be the answers it provides. Rather, it has forced me to think more carefully about the nature of human judgment and why that judgment remains

indispensable to the professions.

A recent decision of the Quebec Superior Court illustrates the point. The court annulled an arbitration award after concluding that the arbitrator relied upon legal authorities that apparently did not exist, authorities that the court believed were likely generated by artificial intelligence without adequate verification. The decision has generated considerable discussion within the arbitration community, but I believe its significance extends well beyond arbitration. The court was not condemning artificial intelligence. It was reminding us that while technology may assist a decision-maker, it cannot relieve that decision-maker of the responsibility to exercise independent judgment.

That distinction strikes me as profoundly important.

For more than forty years I have practiced law. During that time I have represented clients in litigation, negotiated settlements, served as an arbitrator, acted as a mediator, and provided expert testimony in state and federal proceedings. Although those roles differ in many respects, I have gradually come to appreciate that they all depend upon the same fundamental skill. Each requires the disciplined exercise of judgment.

To me, judgment is the thoughtful application of experience to uncertainty. It requires evaluating incomplete information, assigning appropriate weight to competing facts, recognizing which issues truly matter, anticipating consequences, acknowledging uncertainty, and ultimately reaching a reasoned conclusion while accepting responsibility for that conclusion. Knowledge contributes to judgment. Experience refines it. Reflection strengthens it. Accountability completes it.

That last component deserves emphasis because it distinguishes professional judgment from information processing. Information can be gathered. Data can be organized. Arguments can be summarized. Those are important tasks, and artificial intelligence performs many of them extraordinarily well. Judgment begins only after those tasks have been completed. Someone must decide what deserves weight, what deserves skepticism, what additional questions must be asked, and whether the proposed conclusion genuinely follows from the evidence.

My understanding of that distinction began long before artificial intelligence entered the

conversation. It began with my father, who practiced medicine throughout his professional life. He often explained that medicine was both a science and an art. As a younger man, I regarded that observation as an elegant phrase. Only later did I begin to understand its depth.

My father would contrast medicine with arithmetic. Four plus three equals seven. It has always equaled seven, it equals seven today, and it will continue to equal seven tomorrow. Arithmetic is formulaic. If the numbers remain constant, the answer remains constant.

Medicine does not work that way.

Two experienced physicians may examine the same patient, review the same laboratory results, and recommend different courses of treatment. Neither physician is necessarily wrong. Both possess the same scientific knowledge. What differs is the application of experience, perspective, and professional judgment to an individual whose circumstances rarely fit neatly within a formula.

The practice of law is remarkably similar.

Young lawyers often believe that difficult cases are resolved by locating the correct statute or appellate decision. Experience teaches otherwise. Facts are incomplete. Witnesses disagree. Contracts contain ambiguities. Human memory is imperfect. Business realities evolve. Two excellent lawyers may honestly disagree about the significance of the same evidence because each assigns different weight to competing considerations. That disagreement is not necessarily evidence that one lacks knowledge. More often, it reflects the reality that judgment cannot be reduced to arithmetic.

Artificial intelligence does not change that reality. It changes the tools available to professionals exercising judgment.

I frequently describe AI as a toolbox. A skilled carpenter is not admired because he owns an impressive collection of tools. He is respected because he knows which tool is appropriate for a particular task, how to use it effectively, and equally important, when not to use it at all. A hammer is an excellent tool. It is also a poor substitute for a screwdriver. The problem is never the hammer. The problem lies in using the wrong tool for the wrong purpose.

Artificial intelligence occupies a similar place within my own practice. It helps organize information. It helps identify issues I may wish to explore. It challenges my assumptions. It frequently improves the clarity of my writing. Perhaps most importantly, it forces me to think more critically about whether my own conclusions are fully supported.

I have discovered that the greatest value of AI is not that it gives me better answers. It gives me better questions.

There is, however, another dimension of judgment that receives far less attention, and I believe it is one of the qualities that separates experienced professionals from those who possess knowledge alone.

Judgment understands timing.

One of the most fascinating aspects of dispute resolution is that the objectively reasonable solution is often visible long before the parties are capable of accepting it. Every experienced mediator has witnessed this phenomenon. A settlement proposal rejected outright in February may become entirely acceptable in September. The proposal has not changed. The parties have.

During those intervening months, discovery may have occurred. Depositions may have altered perceptions. Legal fees may have accumulated. Business relationships may have deteriorated. Risks that once seemed theoretical may have become immediate and real. The dispute itself has matured.

That is why I have often come to think of litigation, arbitration, and mediation as having a rhythm. Disputes unfold over time. They have moments when progress is possible and moments when it is not. The experienced mediator recognizes that timing is not incidental to settlement; it is often central to it. Sometimes the most valuable contribution a mediator can make is not proposing a solution but allowing the parties sufficient time to reach the point where the solution becomes their own.

Artificial intelligence can evaluate information.

I am not persuaded that it can yet recognize readiness.

Nor am I convinced that judgment depends solely upon experience. It also depends upon trust.

Throughout my career, I cannot tell you how many times I have met with a husband and wife, two siblings, longtime business partners, or close friends seeking legal advice. After discussing the facts and explaining the governing law, I would offer my opinion. Almost invariably, one of them would turn to the other and say, "I told you."

What changed during that meeting?

Usually not the information. Most often, both individuals already possessed the relevant facts. Frequently, one of them had been making precisely the same point for weeks or months. The difference was not the message. The difference was the messenger.

People sometimes need to hear difficult conclusions from someone they perceive as independent. They place confidence not only in experience but also in neutrality. They trust that an outside professional is not influenced by the history, emotion, frustration, or personal investment that naturally accompanies most disputes.

That observation helps explain why arbitrators, mediators, and expert witnesses continue to play such an important role despite dramatic advances in technology. Their value does not lie solely in possessing information. It lies in the confidence that others place in the independence of their judgment.

This brings me back to the Quebec decision.

The court did not suggest that artificial intelligence has no place in the legal profession. In fact, I believe the opposite is true. Lawyers, arbitrators, mediators, and experts should embrace tools that improve efficiency, organization, and analysis. The danger identified by the court was not the use of technology. It was the delegation of judgment.

Those are fundamentally different concepts.

Artificial intelligence should help professionals think more clearly. It should never relieve them of the obligation to think independently. When clients retain an expert witness, they are not purchasing a report. The report is simply the written expression of an opinion. What they are truly purchasing is the judgment that produced that opinion.

When parties appoint an arbitrator, they are not selecting someone because that individual can write an award efficiently. They are selecting the person whose judgment they trust to evaluate evidence fairly and reach an independent conclusion.

When parties engage a mediator, they are not paying for settlement proposals. They are seeking someone who possesses sufficient experience and perspective to recognize opportunities for resolution that the participants themselves may not yet be prepared to see.

The same is true of lawyers. Clients are rarely paying us to locate statutes or summarize cases. Increasingly, technology can assist with those tasks. They are paying us to help them navigate uncertainty through the exercise of thoughtful, accountable judgment.

As artificial intelligence continues to evolve, I expect it will become an even more valuable professional tool. I welcome that development. Every profession benefits from improvements that allow its practitioners to work more efficiently and more thoughtfully.

The emergence of artificial intelligence has not diminished my appreciation for human judgment. Quite the opposite. It has clarified why judgment matters.

When I began this essay, I asked a simple question: What is judgment?

After more than four decades practicing law, serving as an arbitrator, acting as a mediator, and providing expert testimony, my answer is this: judgment is the thoughtful application of experience to uncertainty by someone willing to accept responsibility for the result. It is informed by knowledge but not defined by it. It is strengthened by experience but never completed by experience alone. It requires independence, humility, timing, and the willingness to continually question one's own conclusions.

My father taught me that medicine was both a science and an art. The older I become, the more convinced I am that the same is true of the law. Artificial intelligence represents one of the most powerful scientific tools our profession has ever seen. It will continue to improve, and we should continue to improve with it.

But tools, no matter how sophisticated, remain tools.

Clients do not retain lawyers, mediators, arbitrators, and expert witnesses because they possess better tools than anyone else.

They retain them because they trust the judgment with which those tools are used.

…….

Ralph A. Cantafio is an arbitrator, mediator, and expert witness whose practice focuses on upstream oil and gas disputes, including lease interpretation, mineral title, royalty, operating agreement, surface use, and related commercial and regulatory matters. A member of the American Arbitration Association's arbitration panel, he brings nearly 40 years of experience and a practical, business-oriented approach to resolving complex energy disputes.

Website: www.myralphlaw.com

Email: ralph@myralphlaw.com

Phone: 970.819.2371