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This recent season, I found myself navigating in congested traffic on the sweltering streets of a southern French city. At an intersection, my companion in the passenger seat advised a right turn toward a renowned spot for bouillabaisse. Yet, the navigation app on my phone commanded us to continue straight. Fatigued and in a stifling car, I heeded the app's advice. Moments later, we were stuck at a construction site.

A seemingly trivial incident, perhaps. But one that encapsulates a defining dilemma of our era, where digital tools touches nearly every facet of our lives: whom do we trust more – other people and our own intuition, or the machine?

The Enlightenment's Promise and Our Modern Relapse

The influential German philosopher Immanuel Kant once defined the Enlightenment as "humanity's emergence from its self-imposed nonage." This immaturity, he wrote, "is the incapacity to use one's personal reason without guidance from an external source." For centuries, that directing force for human thought was frequently the priest, the monarch, or the feudal lord – entities claiming to speak for God's voice. To explain phenomena like changing seasons, people sought answers in theology. In shaping the fabric of society, from economics to love, faith served as the primary guide.

“Sapere aude!” or “Dare to use your reason!”

Kant argued that humans had the capacity for reason. They just didn't have the confidence to use it. With revolutions in the 18th century, a new dawn emerged: logic would supplant blind faith, and the intellect, freed from authority, would become the engine of advancement and a more ethical world.

Now, two and a half centuries later, one might question if we are quietly regressing into a form of intellectual immaturity. An app suggesting a direction is merely the start. AI threatens to become our new "other" – a unseen overseer that steers our choices and behaviors. We are in danger of relinquishing the historically earned courage to think independently – and now, not to deities or rulers, but to lines of code.

The Swift Adoption and Subtle Dangers of Algorithmic Reliance

ChatGPT debuted only in 2022, and yet a recent study indicated that an overwhelming majority of people had used AI in the preceding half-year. Whether contemplating a breakup or selecting a vote, individuals are increasingly turning to algorithms for counsel. Data suggests a large majority of user queries relate to personal life matters. Even more striking than our reliance on AI for advice is what occurs when we let it express for us. Writing is now one of the most common uses for tools like ChatGPT, second only to everyday tasks. The late American author Joan Didion famously said, “I write entirely to discover what I am thinking.” What transpires when we cease writing? Do we lose that path?

Alarmingly, some evidence hints the outcome may be yes. A study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used electroencephalography to track the cognitive activity of participants who had access to AI, traditional search engines, or no aids. Those who could use AI displayed the lowest brain activity and had trouble accurately recalling their own work. Maybe most concerning was that over time, individuals in the AI group grew progressively lazier, pasting large sections of text.

“Laziness and cowardice,” Kant wrote, “are the reasons why so many of men … remain in lifelong immaturity.”

Certainly, AI's attraction stems from its convenience. It saves time, reduces effort and – importantly – offers a novel way to offload responsibility. In his 1941 book, Escape from Freedom, the German psychoanalyst Erich Fromm proposed that the appeal of authoritarianism could be understood by a preference to give up autonomy in for the sake of the comforting security of obedience. AI offers a modern avenue for surrendering the weight of having to decide for oneself.

The Opacity Dilemma: Faith Over Reason

AI's greatest allure is its capacity to perform tasks beyond human capability – analyzing oceans of data at unprecedented speed. Sitting in the car in Marseille, this was, ultimately, why I opted to trust the machine over my companion (a choice she took as an affront). With knowledge of real-time information, surely the app must know best – or so I thought.

The core issue is that AI operates as a opaque system. It produces knowledge, but not always fostering human understanding. We do not truly know how AI reaches its conclusions – even its creators acknowledge the opacity. Nor can we verify its logic against transparent standards. So when we heed AI's recommendation, we are not being led by logic. We are returning to the domain of belief. In dubio pro machina: when in doubt, side with the machine – that may become our future credo.

Harnessing Without Eroding: The Essential Challenge

AI can be a formidable ally for mankind in rational inquiry. It can aid in inventing drugs, liberate us from "bullshit jobs", or manage taxes – work that are repetitive and offer little satisfaction. This is beneficial. But Kant and his peers did not advocate for enlightenment just so humans could optimize chores or have more leisure. Critical thinking was not just about productivity – it was a practice of freedom and human self-determination.

Human thought is inherently messy and fallible, but it compels us to debate, to doubt, to challenge concepts – and to recognize the limits of our own understanding. It builds self-reliance, both personally and as a society. For Kant, the use of reason was never only about acquiring knowledge; it was about enabling people to become agents of their own lives, and to resist control. It was about creating a ethical society grounded in the common foundation of reason and debate, rather than blind belief.

With all the undeniable benefits AI brings, the key question remains: how can we harness its potential of advanced capability without eroding human reasoning, the bedrock of the Enlightenment and of liberal democracy itself? That is likely one of the defining questions of our time. It is a question we would do well not to outsource to the algorithm.