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This past summer, I found myself navigating in congested traffic on the sweltering streets of a southern French city. At a crossing, my companion in the front seat advised a right turn toward a renowned spot for bouillabaisse. However, the navigation app on my phone instructed us to continue straight. Fatigued and in a stifling car, I heeded the algorithm's directive. Moments later, we were stuck at a construction site.

A minor incident, maybe. But one that encapsulates a central dilemma of our time, where technology permeates almost every aspect of existence: who gets our trust to a greater degree – fellow humans and our own intuition, or the machine?

A Call for Intellectual Maturity and Our Modern Relapse

The renowned German philosopher Immanuel Kant famously described the Enlightenment as "humanity's emergence from its self-imposed immaturity." This immaturity, he argued, "is the incapacity to use one's personal reason without guidance from an external source." For ages, that guiding "other" for human thought was frequently the priest, the monarch, or the landowner – figures purporting to channel divine will. To explain natural events like changing seasons, people looked for explanations in theology. In shaping the fabric of society, from commerce to love, faith acted as the primary guide.

“Sapere aude!” or “Dare to use your own understanding!”

Kant maintained that humans had the ability to think rationally. They simply lacked the boldness to employ it. With upheavals in the 18th century, a fresh era emerged: logic would replace blind faith, and the human mind, freed from authority, would become the driver of advancement and a more ethical world.

Now, two and a half centuries later, one might wonder if we are quietly regressing into a state of intellectual immaturity. An app suggesting a direction is merely the start. Artificial intelligence threatens to become our contemporary authority – a unseen overseer that steers our choices and behaviors. We are in danger of ceding the hard-won autonomy to reason for ourselves – and now, not to gods or kings, but to lines of code.

The Swift Adoption and Hidden Risks of AI Dependence

ChatGPT was launched a mere three years ago, and already a recent study indicated that an overwhelming majority of people had used AI in the previous six months. Whether contemplating ending a relationship or choosing a candidate, individuals are looking to algorithms for guidance. Data suggests a large majority of user queries concern non-work topics. Even more striking than our use of AI for advice is what happens when we let it speak for us. Writing is now among the most common uses for tools like ChatGPT, second only to practical requests. The celebrated American author Joan Didion famously said, “I write purely to find out what I am thinking.” What occurs when we cease writing? Do we cease discovering?

Alarmingly, some evidence suggests the outcome may be yes. A study conducted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used electroencephalography to track the cognitive activity of participants who had access to AI, Google, or no aids. Those who could rely on AI displayed the lowest cognitive engagement and had trouble accurately recalling their own work. Perhaps most troubling was that over time, individuals in the AI group became increasingly reliant, copying entire blocks of text.

“Laziness and cowardice,” Kant wrote, “are the reasons why so many of men … stay in perpetual nonage.”

Of course, AI's attraction stems from its convenience. It saves time, reduces effort and – critically – offers a new method to offload accountability. In his 1941 book, Escape from Freedom, the German psychoanalyst Erich Fromm argued that the rise of fascism could be understood by a human tendency to give up personal freedom in exchange for the comforting security of subordination. AI offers a digital method of relinquishing the weight of having to think and choose.

The Black Box Problem: Faith Over Reason

AI's primary draw is its ability to accomplish things beyond our minds – analyzing vast datasets at lightning pace. Stuck in the car in Marseille, this was, ultimately, why I chose to believe the app over my friend (a decision she took as an affront). With knowledge of all the data, certainly the app must know best – or so I believed.

The core issue is that AI is a black box. It generates answers, but without necessarily fostering human comprehension. We cannot fully grasp the process behind its conclusions – including its programmers acknowledge the opacity. Nor can we check its reasoning against transparent standards. So when we follow AI's advice, we are not being led by logic. We are returning to the domain of faith. In dubio pro machina: when in doubt, side with the machine – that may become our 21st-century guiding principle.

Using Without Losing: The Essential Challenge

AI can be a formidable ally for mankind in rational inquiry. It can aid in inventing drugs, liberate us from tedious tasks, or handle administrative chores – duties that are repetitive and are unfulfilling. All to the good. But Kant and his peers did not advocate for enlightenment just so humans could optimize chores or have extra free time. Independent thought was not just about productivity – it was a practice of freedom and human emancipation.

Human thought is inherently messy and error-prone, but it forces us to argue, to question, to test ideas – and to recognize the boundaries of our own knowledge. It fosters self-reliance, both personally and as a society. For Kant, the exercise of reason was never only about acquiring knowledge; it was about enabling people to become agents of their own lives, and to resist domination. It was about building a moral community grounded in the shared principle of rational discourse, rather than unquestioning acceptance.

With all the undeniable benefits AI brings, the paramount challenge remains: how can we harness its potential of superhuman intelligence without undermining human reasoning, the bedrock of the Enlightenment and of liberal democracy itself? That may be one of the central dilemmas of our time. It is a question we must strive not to outsource to the algorithm.