Please Hold for a Licensed Human
Year: 2026
Type: preprint
Abstract: An automated message — "Your matter has been resolved. If you believe it requires a licensed human, please remain on the line" — could serve a law firm or a clinic. This essay asks three separate questions when an AI agent acts without an intervening professional: who had authority to offer the service, who owed a duty to the person relying on it, and which insurance policy, if any, responds. It discusses Crosby's $5 million AI liability policy, the boundary between clerical playbook work and advice a client reasonably relies on, an LLM study of reasons for leaving lipid-lowering therapy unchanged, correlated errors across clinics, Wyoming's unlicensed-practice statute, and the history of state medical boards after Flexner. It argues for a written coverage analysis before giving an agent authority to act, and for a human who can inspect, sample, stop, and answer for the system.
Author: Newhall, Stanley Clark
Language: English
Subfield: Law
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7225636488
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