March 3, 2023 | less than a minute read

Don't Blame Chat GPT for not Doing Your Job

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Mark Carter

Partner

Get in touch

Mark Carter

Partner

Admittedly, I don't know the facts behind the below quote where, apparently, an attorney submitted to the court an incorrect document without citations and blamed ChatGPT. As an attorney in my 20th year, I live by the axiom of there being three sides to every story; yours, mine and the truth. But seriously? If one of my associates messes up a brief that is submitted to the court and the judge calls me out on it, guess what? That's my fault. Should be no different with ChatGPT.

Recently officials at Vanderbilt University faced public backlash for using the chatbot to write a conciliatory email to their student body in the wake of the Michigan State shooting (ChatGPT was credited in the letter itself). Paula Frederick, general counsel at the State Bar of Georgia, said that, just this week, the Georgia bar’s ethics hotline had their first instance of a lawyer getting in trouble in court for submitting an incorrect document without citations and laying the blame on ChatGPT. According to Fredrick, “that did not go well with the judge.”