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I can't get my head around why most lawyers portray themselves as "smart", why people genuinely buy into law firm gimmicks or stereotypes that they are "where bright / intelligent minds meet" or some bullsh*t. It is as if law requires any intellect at all. There are truly smart and intelligent people who win medals at STEM Olympiads and engineer spacecraft to reach new heights for mankind, and then there are these lawyers who have average or below-average intelligence who brag about how intelligent they are, b*tching about words in a Word document everyday.
All you need is some degree of literacy in your own native language (English) and nothing else, not even a degree nowadays considering solicitor apprenticeships are a big thing now. Anyone who is literate enough to read newspapers can already roughly understand a judgment, law, or a legal textbook. Latin jargons can be Googled in an instant. (If English is not your native language just use Duolingo for a year or two.)
All a lawyer ever does is reading tedious amount of paperwork, checking formatting and cross-references, copy-and-pasting document templates then changing the names of parties, doing some legal research to find things that are already there instead of creating something, and that's about it. Nothing that the average person cannot do. Nothing that AI cannot do faster and cheaper now or in the near future.
Law school is only about hard work, reading, memorising and applying arbitrary laws, statutes and case law which are just manmade rules and formalities which happen to be in a law book. There is not a purely logical reason why a parking penalty should be e.g. £100 instead of £94.5, £35 or £1000. Law school essays are usually bog-standard essays with the same structure as ChatGPT answers that anyone can write after a few Google searches. There is nothing in academic law that can be justified by pure logical reasoning, whereas mathematics, physics, and engineering (& most of STEM) are probably the truly intellectually stimulating subjects that requires any raw intellectual power.
I have worked in law firms and either (i) a lot of them or (ii) virtually all of the lawyers or partners are just dumb people who are not nearly smart enough for any STEM subjects, so they chose soft mickey mouse subjects such as English Literature, Religious Studies and Psychology etc for their A-Levels. If it takes talent to recognise another talent, then the "Talent Acquisition" specialists / recruiters are probably the last things you would entrust the task of talent-spotting with, probably CDDs in humanities A-Levels and some mickey mouse literature degree from Arse-end University. I also have evidence that a lawyer / solicitor / professional from a Magic Circle law firm in London who laughed at and made fun of an IP client's scientific documents as if genetic sequence is gibberish / typed by a pet animal who sat on a keyboard. This is honestly embarrassing for the whole legal sector / industry.
If law is truly intellectually challenging and stimulating then why is law the most boring job ever according to surveys and polls? Those who embellish their training contract / pupillage applications well enough to bag a place are probably also liars.
The billable hours model is a counterproductive system that rewards inefficiency. Law firm IT systems / databases are purposefully made as tedious and primitive as possible and require tedious manual entry in order to churn out more billable hours to invoice to the clients. The legal industry is literally dragging human progress down.
Law firms portray and think of themselves as some unique leading institution that delivers unique solutions. It's not like there is any creative, artistic, or scientific element. Every piece of legal work is the same tedious boring dull paperwork review etc where you either f**ked up or you didn't.
Any lawyers (solicitors and barristers alike) here who would like to disagree?
All you need is some degree of literacy in your own native language (English) and nothing else, not even a degree nowadays considering solicitor apprenticeships are a big thing now. Anyone who is literate enough to read newspapers can already roughly understand a judgment, law, or a legal textbook. Latin jargons can be Googled in an instant. (If English is not your native language just use Duolingo for a year or two.)
All a lawyer ever does is reading tedious amount of paperwork, checking formatting and cross-references, copy-and-pasting document templates then changing the names of parties, doing some legal research to find things that are already there instead of creating something, and that's about it. Nothing that the average person cannot do. Nothing that AI cannot do faster and cheaper now or in the near future.
Law school is only about hard work, reading, memorising and applying arbitrary laws, statutes and case law which are just manmade rules and formalities which happen to be in a law book. There is not a purely logical reason why a parking penalty should be e.g. £100 instead of £94.5, £35 or £1000. Law school essays are usually bog-standard essays with the same structure as ChatGPT answers that anyone can write after a few Google searches. There is nothing in academic law that can be justified by pure logical reasoning, whereas mathematics, physics, and engineering (& most of STEM) are probably the truly intellectually stimulating subjects that requires any raw intellectual power.
I have worked in law firms and either (i) a lot of them or (ii) virtually all of the lawyers or partners are just dumb people who are not nearly smart enough for any STEM subjects, so they chose soft mickey mouse subjects such as English Literature, Religious Studies and Psychology etc for their A-Levels. If it takes talent to recognise another talent, then the "Talent Acquisition" specialists / recruiters are probably the last things you would entrust the task of talent-spotting with, probably CDDs in humanities A-Levels and some mickey mouse literature degree from Arse-end University. I also have evidence that a lawyer / solicitor / professional from a Magic Circle law firm in London who laughed at and made fun of an IP client's scientific documents as if genetic sequence is gibberish / typed by a pet animal who sat on a keyboard. This is honestly embarrassing for the whole legal sector / industry.
If law is truly intellectually challenging and stimulating then why is law the most boring job ever according to surveys and polls? Those who embellish their training contract / pupillage applications well enough to bag a place are probably also liars.
The billable hours model is a counterproductive system that rewards inefficiency. Law firm IT systems / databases are purposefully made as tedious and primitive as possible and require tedious manual entry in order to churn out more billable hours to invoice to the clients. The legal industry is literally dragging human progress down.
Law firms portray and think of themselves as some unique leading institution that delivers unique solutions. It's not like there is any creative, artistic, or scientific element. Every piece of legal work is the same tedious boring dull paperwork review etc where you either f**ked up or you didn't.
Any lawyers (solicitors and barristers alike) here who would like to disagree?
(edited 4 months ago)
The only person I see bragging here is you. You're the type of person who gives us Engineering students a bad rep. I have nothing but respect for other courses including Law. I go to talks with students doing the course and I will always say 'hats off to them'. The sheer amount of content they have to self-study each week throughout their training and career is astonishing, the resilience they grow starting from their entry exam days, the discipline needed to study the course. I could go on and on. I salute them.
Sure, I can solve pages upon pages of complex eigenvectors and PDEs. I can tear apart complex physics questions. That does not make me any smarter than a Law student or a Lawyer. That just means my strengths lie in a different area. I don't know why you went out of your way to badmouth an entire degree, and group of people. Doing STEM doesn't place you on some pedestal or indicate that you're more intelligent. There are many Art students who are more intelligent than a lot of STEM students. They just chose a course they like just as I chose a course I like. Let people enjoy what they do.
Sure, I can solve pages upon pages of complex eigenvectors and PDEs. I can tear apart complex physics questions. That does not make me any smarter than a Law student or a Lawyer. That just means my strengths lie in a different area. I don't know why you went out of your way to badmouth an entire degree, and group of people. Doing STEM doesn't place you on some pedestal or indicate that you're more intelligent. There are many Art students who are more intelligent than a lot of STEM students. They just chose a course they like just as I chose a course I like. Let people enjoy what they do.
Original post by booboosaurus
Self-study for the altruistic enrichment of humanity? No, they are and they proudly admit they are "ambitious", which means wanting to earn 6-7 figures per annum at some white shoe big buck US law firm or some magic circus law firm doing corporate paperwork (which has absolutely no elements of ingenuity or creativity, and certainly won't benefit the less privileged echelons of society). The fact that you think they are deserving of salute shows how f--ked up this society is. Even corporate lawyers think they are working a bulls**t job whose existence is hard to justify.*
These law firms want juniors to waste their lives on paperwork that could be easily automated by AI in the present or in the near future because BILLABLE HOURS, the most counterproductive concept I've ever known of.*
How could law firms survive let alone be as profitable as they are now if they truly and fully implemented AI in their work, which would make the completion of work near instantaneous and potentially more accurate due to the lack of human errors? If you can't already tell, law firms are fundamentally opposed to true efficiency and innovation.*
The ones deserving salute are engineers like Nikola Tesla who contributed so much to mankind with his ingenuity and toil, without expecting anything in return.*
How could law firms survive let alone be as profitable as they are now if they truly and fully implemented AI in their work, which would make the completion of work near instantaneous and potentially more accurate due to the lack of human errors? If you can't already tell, law firms are fundamentally opposed to true efficiency and innovation.*
The ones deserving salute are engineers like Nikola Tesla who contributed so much to mankind with his ingenuity and toil, without expecting anything in return.*
This is hilarious. I don't know how selfless you want humans to be. Even the engineers you place on a pedestal are doing all the self-study we do to earn 6-7 figures. Yes. We do it for the big bucks too. We sure aren't doing it for the 'altruistic enrichment of humanity'.
I suggest you try to find some peace because this unnecessary hate towards lawyers is absurd. Once again, I salute any hardworking law students and lawyers who came across this thread.
(edited 4 months ago)
Original post by DarylO
This is hilarious. I don't know how selfless you want humans to be. Even the engineers you place on a pedestal are doing all the self-study we do to earn 6-7 figures. Yes. We do it for the big bucks too. We sure aren't doing it for the 'altruistic enrichment of humanity'.
I suggest you try to find some peace because this unnecessary hate towards lawyers is absurd. Once again, I salute any hardworking law students and lawyers who came across this thread.
I suggest you try to find some peace because this unnecessary hate towards lawyers is absurd. Once again, I salute any hardworking law students and lawyers who came across this thread.
Altruism does not necessarily preclude any financial gain, I think most people would prefer their work to be both financially rewarding and meaningful at the same time. NASA engineers aren't volunteers and get paid big bucks, but what they do is at least capable of advancing mankind.
Commercial legal paperwork, on the other hand, is ONLY about the money, so we can COMPLETELY EXCLUDE any meaning / contribution / altruism. So it's a valid conclusion that most commercial lawyers are neither as bright as they think nor do they contribute anything meaningful to mankind at all.
That's pretty simple right? Or is it too complicated for your understanding?
Original post by booboosaurus
Altruism does not necessarily preclude any financial gain, I think most people would prefer their work to be both financially rewarding and meaningful at the same time. NASA engineers aren't volunteers and get paid big bucks, but what they do is at least capable of advancing mankind.
Commercial legal paperwork, on the other hand, is ONLY about the money, so we can COMPLETELY EXCLUDE any meaning / contribution / altruism. So it's a valid conclusion that most commercial lawyers are neither as bright as they think nor do they contribute anything meaningful to mankind at all.
That's pretty simple right? Or is it too complicated for your understanding?
Commercial legal paperwork, on the other hand, is ONLY about the money, so we can COMPLETELY EXCLUDE any meaning / contribution / altruism. So it's a valid conclusion that most commercial lawyers are neither as bright as they think nor do they contribute anything meaningful to mankind at all.
That's pretty simple right? Or is it too complicated for your understanding?
Just sounds like cope, you're probably a failed STEM student who gets mad when non-STEM students see success.
The idea that a rocket scientist and a Lawyer are comparable just shows a lack of logical reasoning, they both take completely different roles in society and attempt to offer different contributions. Plus this idea that all STEM students have some insane contribution to society completely ignores all of the negatives of technology.
Original post by booboosaurus
Any lawyers (solicitors and barristers alike) here who would like to disagree?
Sure, but for all the vitriol I'm not sure you've actually said anything about barristers at all. Your target seems to be particularly commercial solicitors. Much of what you have written about them isn't accurate anyway, but it certainly doesn't apply to solicitors working in most other practice areas. The irony about your opening post is that I have written regularly about intellect being overrated when it comes to practising as a barrister. But even for those lawyers who have not openly said the same thing, I deal with other barristers and solicitors regularly, and I cannot remember the last time a single one of them bragged about how intelligent they are. I regularly talk to solicitors who I would like to get work from, and the last thing I would do is to stress how intelligent I am. It's just not something that people do in the real world, so I'm not sure where you've got that impression from. But in any event, if you do have any particular ire against barristers, I'm sure you can let me know and we'll see where it takes us.
Original post by booboosaurus
Altruism does not necessarily preclude any financial gain, I think most people would prefer their work to be both financially rewarding and meaningful at the same time. NASA engineers aren't volunteers and get paid big bucks, but what they do is at least capable of advancing mankind.
Commercial legal paperwork, on the other hand, is ONLY about the money, so we can COMPLETELY EXCLUDE any meaning / contribution / altruism. So it's a valid conclusion that most commercial lawyers are neither as bright as they think nor do they contribute anything meaningful to mankind at all.
That's pretty simple right? Or is it too complicated for your understanding?
Commercial legal paperwork, on the other hand, is ONLY about the money, so we can COMPLETELY EXCLUDE any meaning / contribution / altruism. So it's a valid conclusion that most commercial lawyers are neither as bright as they think nor do they contribute anything meaningful to mankind at all.
That's pretty simple right? Or is it too complicated for your understanding?
I find it funny that the earlier posts place STEM students on an intellectual pedestal but the moment a STEM student doesn't agree with you, you make condescending remarks that question my ability to understand a simple TSR comment. I thought we were all so intelligent?
I'm surrounded by students who want to make nuclear bombs, and don't care who those bombs could be used on as long as they get paid a lot. If you count weapons of mass destruction as altruistic contributions to society, be my guest. Then, there are students who want to get into fields like Sustainable Robotics so they don't leave a negative impact on the earth. I belong to the latter group, and that still doesn't place me on some pedestal above my money-driven mates or commercial lawyers. Everyone has what drives them. If that's money, there's nothing wrong with that. We don't all have to sacrifice ourselves or our goals for the world.
Also, why don't you answer the questions the others asked? Too complicated for your understanding?
