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This recent season, I found myself navigating in congested traffic on the scorching streets of a southern French city. At a crossing, my friend in the front seat suggested a right turn toward a renowned spot for fish soup. However, the navigation app on my phone instructed us to continue straight. Fatigued and overheated, I followed the algorithm's directive. Moments later, we were stranded at a construction site.

A minor incident, perhaps. But one that encapsulates a defining question of our time, where technology touches nearly every facet of existence: who gets our trust more – fellow humans and our own intuition, or the machine?

A Call for Intellectual Maturity and A Contemporary Backslide

The influential German philosopher Immanuel Kant famously described the Enlightenment as "man's release from its self-inflicted immaturity." This immaturity, he argued, "is the incapacity to use one's personal reason without direction from an external source." For centuries, that guiding "other" for society was often the clergyman, the monarch, or the feudal lord – entities claiming to channel divine will. To explain phenomena like changing seasons, people sought answers in religion. In shaping the fabric of society, from commerce to matters of the heart, religious doctrine served as the primary guide.

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

Kant argued that humans had the ability to think rationally. They simply lacked the confidence to employ it. With revolutions in the 18th century, a new dawn emerged: logic would replace superstition, and the human mind, liberated from dogma, would become the engine of advancement and a better world.

Now, 250 years later, one might wonder if we are quietly regressing into a state of dependency. An app suggesting a driving route is merely the start. AI risks becoming our contemporary authority – a silent guide that influences our choices and actions. We are in danger of relinquishing the historically earned autonomy to think independently – and this time, not to deities or rulers, but to computer programs.

The Swift Adoption and Subtle Dangers of AI Dependence

ChatGPT was launched a mere three years ago, and already a recent study indicated that an vast number of people had used AI in the preceding half-year. Whether deciding on a breakup or selecting a vote, individuals are looking to algorithms for counsel. Research suggests a large majority of user prompts concern non-work topics. Even more intriguing than our reliance on AI for judgment is what happens when we allow it speak for us. Writing is now among the most common uses for tools like ChatGPT, just behind practical requests. The late American author Joan Didion famously said, “I write purely to discover what I am thinking.” What occurs when we cease writing? Do we lose that path?

Worryingly, some evidence suggests the outcome may be yes. A study conducted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used brain monitoring to observe the mental engagement of essay writers who had could use AI, Google, or nothing. Those who could use AI showed the least cognitive engagement and had difficulty accurately recalling their own work. Maybe most troubling was that after a few months, participants in the AI group grew progressively lazier, pasting entire blocks of text.

“Laziness and cowardice,” Kant wrote, “are the reasons why so great a proportion of men … remain in perpetual nonage.”

Of course, AI's appeal lies in its efficiency. It is fast, reduces effort and – importantly – offers a novel way to abdicate 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 surrender personal freedom in for the sake of the comforting security of obedience. AI offers a modern avenue for surrendering the burden of having to decide for oneself.

The Black Box Problem: Trust Without Understanding

AI's greatest allure is its capacity to perform tasks beyond our minds – sifting through oceans of data at unprecedented speed. Stuck in the car in Marseille, this was, ultimately, why I opted to trust the machine over my companion (a decision she took as an insult). With access to real-time information, surely the app had superior insight – or so I believed.

The core issue is that AI is a opaque system. It produces knowledge, but without necessarily fostering human understanding. We do not truly know how AI reaches its decisions – including its programmers acknowledge the opacity. Nor can we verify its reasoning against clear, objective criteria. So when we heed AI's recommendation, we are not being guided by reason. We are back in the realm of faith. In dubio pro machina: when in doubt, trust the machine – that may become our future guiding principle.

Using Without Losing: The Critical Balance

AI can be a powerful tool for mankind in rational inquiry. It can aid in medical research, liberate us from "bullshit jobs", or handle administrative chores – duties that demand little thought and are unfulfilling. All to the good. But Kant and his contemporaries did not advocate for reason over faith just so humans could assemble better furniture or have more leisure. Independent thought was not just about efficiency – it was a practice of liberty and human emancipation.

Human thought is inherently messy and fallible, but it compels us to debate, to doubt, to test ideas – and to acknowledge the boundaries of our own understanding. It fosters confidence, both personally and as a society. For Kant, the use of reason was never solely about acquiring knowledge; it was about empowering people to become agents of their own lives, and to oppose control. It was about creating a moral community based on the shared principle of reason and debate, 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 rationality, the cornerstone of the Enlightenment and of free societies itself? That is likely one of the central dilemmas of our time. It is a question we must strive not to outsource to the machine.