[autoexec]

> Even if it's just an IQ check, I would want my lawyer to have a high IQ, social Darwinism or not.

You can have a high IQ and be terrible and memorizing and regurgitating a bunch of facts and figures. I've seen people who were literal geniuses fail tests that others who were... lets say, 'very much not geniuses' passed without a problem because they were skilled in cramming for a few weeks to get their certification even while never having a real deep understanding of the subject and pretty much immediately forgetting everything they "learned".

IQ (for what it's worth) is more about being able to figure out what's in front of you than it is having a great memory for numbers, trivia, dates, or laws and past legal cases.

[watwut]

If you are terrible at memorizing, you won't be good layer. They do actually need to remember a lot and quickly. And they don't have time to look up everything either.

[autoexec]

Not being a lawyer I can only assume the ideal is to be able to keep a lot of details and legal history in your head while also being able to apply what you know in creative and unexpected ways.

From my limited exposure to the profession, it seems like some aspects of legal work might require someone to spontaneously recall vast amounts of information, but much of it also seems to leave plenty of time for research and deep contemplation. The legal system in the US often moves at a glacial pace and legal requests, responses, strategies, and defenses can be crafted carefully and with a lot of time, research, and billable hours going into them. It makes me think that a person could be a good lawyer without the ability to recall a bunch of the types of specifics you'd need to pass the bar, although it might limit their utility leaving them better suited for some tasks than others.

It seems like the issue comes up a lot in talks about AI replacing lawyers. Computers would certainly be better at remembering details, adhering to protocol, processing large volumes of evidence, and recalling relevant laws and the past cases dealing with them, as well as all kinds of analysis humans would struggle with, but I've often seen it argued that while AI might be really great at that kind of thing, exceptional human lawyers need problem solving skills and the ability to apply that information in ways computers would struggle with or never consider. The context is usually that robot lawyers might make legal assistance more accessible and affordable for many people, but those having to depend on it could also end up highly disadvantaged when up against expensive AI-backed human legal teams.

As AI and automation become increasingly used by law firms, or as it starts to actually replace lawyers, I wonder if the bar requirement could end up excluding exactly the kind of people who might better augment the computer systems.

[edmcnulty101]

Well I think there's different aspects to IQ.

Retention is one as well as problem solving.

I think both play an important part in a lot of situations.