Let me tell you about the day I learned why lawyers are called rage-baiters.

My law textbooks, scattered printouts, and fluorescent highlighters in a math and computer science study space clearly caught a stranger’s attention.

The stranger introduced themselves as an AI engineer. I noted that this was timely, as I was working through a case involving hallucinating large language models, referencing the Zhang case.

They seemed genuinely surprised that a law student was familiar with LLM hallucinations.

Was it because we had exposed a technical blind spot, a reminder that even innovation answers to the rule of law?

Or was it the subtler realization that law is a discipline in its own right, not merely an accessory to technology?

Almost immediately, their credentials followed: math and physics PhD candidate, then a job title, then a few more details. It was clear then that the intellectual footing had changed; I was suddenly deemed worth engaging.

The stranger asked about law – an interest I suspected was new. They asked why I study it. I told them I’m drawn to words as they are to numbers. We both seek truth, just by different means.

I didn’t realize I had just opened Pandora’s box. The stranger immediately pulled up a chair, sat across from me, and settled in.

I could tell they had been waiting a long time for this moment. I sensed this wasn’t going to be my usual undergrad or law school debate.

That’s when they laid out their position: law, religion, and social contracts, they argued, lacked objective grounding. Only science, in their view, described what was truly real.

The tables had turned, just as the stranger had once deemed me worthy of a meaningful conversation, I now regarded them as worthy opposing counsel.

I could immediately see the logic in their argument, but I felt compelled to explore the other side by playing devil’s advocate.

I wanted to see if I could persuade a rigorously logical mind to consider that science, too, begins with subjective truths that can later become objective.

Hence, I laid out the facts, breaking the argument down step by step.

1. When Galileo first claimed the Earth was round, it was initially a contested, subjective truth. Today, it’s verifiable with live satellite imagery—so is truth limited to what our technology can confirm?

The stranger recognized my argument but would not admit that even the greatest scientific minds begin with subjective beliefs, which can later become objective truths.

The opposing counsel pulled out a hypothetical on the spot:

2. What if you murdered someone but believed you were innocent? Isn’t the truth still that someone is dead, even if you think you’re not guilty?

The irony was uncanny. I smiled. Welcome to law.

Opposing counsel offered yet another example, persuasive in theory and faintly patronizing in delivery.

3. A squared plus B squared will always equal C squared, they said, then asked if I understood—dropping 1 + 1 = 2 to make sure we were on the “same page”.

As if Pythagoras’ mathematics weren’t already tangled with religious mysticism. Rather than opening that door, I offered a measured defence, framed in their own language and delivered with restraint:

4. “If Schrödinger opened his box, would there be a dead cat… or a potato? Which one is true?”

The point is clear: truth isn’t always fixed, at least not until it’s experienced or observed.

An unspoken silence fell, almost existential in its weight. In that instant, we both recognized that, whether in their world of math or my world of law, everything rests on a set of agreed-upon truths.

Their system was closed: fixed inputs, predictable outputs. Ours is open and adaptive: shaped by context, history, and human judgment. The Constitution isn’t called the “living tree” for nothing.

3 hours had gone by.

Then I declared I’d won every single topic and the overall debate. The clearly flustered stranger, immediately shot back, “That’s not true!” Side eye.

I couldn’t get the math man to admit, out loud, that “1 + 1 = potato” could be true if everyone agreed. As unsatisfying as that was, I was also relieved to see that future AI engineers are not hallucinating like the LLMs they’re building.

If 1 + 1 didn’t equal 2, their whole world might come crashing down. I’m part of the group that will convince you 1 + 1 = potatoes.

How? The Art of Lawyering.