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This past summer, I was caught in congested traffic on the sweltering streets of a southern French city. At a crossing, my friend in the passenger seat suggested a right turn toward a renowned spot for fish soup. Yet, the navigation app on my phone commanded us to continue straight. Fatigued and in a stifling car, I followed the app's directive. Minutes later, we were stuck at a roadwork site.

A seemingly trivial incident, maybe. But one that captures a defining dilemma of our era, where technology touches almost every aspect of our lives: whom do we trust more – fellow humans and our own intuition, or the machine?

The Enlightenment's Promise and A Contemporary Backslide

The renowned German philosopher Immanuel Kant once defined the Enlightenment as "humanity's emergence from its self-imposed nonage." This immaturity, he argued, "is the inability to use one's own understanding without guidance from an external source." For centuries, that directing force for human thought was frequently the clergyman, the king, or the feudal lord – figures purporting to channel divine will. To explain phenomena like changing seasons, people looked for explanations in religion. In organizing the fabric of society, from economics to matters of the heart, religious doctrine acted as the main compass.

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

Kant maintained that humans had the ability to think rationally. They just didn't have the boldness to employ it. With revolutions in the 18th century, a new dawn arrived: reason would supplant superstition, and the human mind, liberated from authority, would become the engine of advancement and a better world.

Today, two and a half centuries later, one might question if we are slipping back into a form of intellectual immaturity. An app suggesting a direction is just one example. AI threatens to become our new "other" – a silent guide that influences our choices and behaviors. We are in danger of relinquishing the hard-won autonomy to reason for ourselves – and this time, not to gods or kings, but to computer programs.

The Rapid Rise and Hidden Risks of AI Dependence

ChatGPT was launched only in 2022, and yet a global survey found that an overwhelming majority of respondents had used AI in the preceding half-year. Whether deciding on ending a relationship or choosing a candidate, individuals are increasingly turning to algorithms for counsel. Research suggests a large majority of user queries relate to personal life matters. Even more striking than our use of AI for advice is what occurs when we allow it speak for us. Composition is now among the most common uses for generative AI, just behind practical requests. The celebrated American author Joan Didion famously said, “I write entirely to find out what I am thinking.” What occurs when we stop composing? Do we lose that path?

Alarmingly, some evidence suggests the outcome may be affirmative. A study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used brain monitoring to track the mental engagement of essay writers who had could use AI, traditional search engines, or nothing. Those who could use AI displayed the lowest brain activity and had difficulty accurately recalling their own work. Maybe most concerning was that after a few months, individuals in the AI group became increasingly reliant, copying large sections of text.

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

Certainly, AI's appeal lies in its convenience. It is fast, reduces effort and – importantly – offers a new method 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 subordination. AI offers a modern avenue for relinquishing the weight of having to decide for oneself.

The Black Box Problem: Faith Over Reason

AI's greatest allure is its capacity to perform tasks beyond our minds – analyzing vast datasets at unprecedented speed. Sitting in the car in Marseille, this was, after all, why I opted to trust the app over my companion (a choice she interpreted as an affront). With knowledge of real-time information, surely the app had superior insight – or so I believed.

The core issue is that AI is a opaque system. It generates answers, but without necessarily deepening human comprehension. We cannot fully grasp how AI reaches its decisions – including its creators acknowledge the opacity. Nor can we verify its reasoning against transparent standards. So when we follow AI's recommendation, we are not being guided by reason. We are returning to the realm of faith. In dubio pro machina: when in doubt, side with the machine – that may become our future credo.

Using Without Losing: The Essential Challenge

AI can be a formidable ally for humanity in rational inquiry. It can help medical research, liberate us from tedious tasks, or handle taxes – work that are repetitive and offer little satisfaction. This is beneficial. But Kant and his contemporaries did not advocate for reason over faith just so humans could optimize chores or have extra free time. Independent thought was not merely about efficiency – it was a discipline of freedom and human emancipation.

Human thought is inherently messy and error-prone, but it forces us to debate, to doubt, to test ideas – and to recognize the boundaries of our own understanding. It builds self-reliance, both personally and collectively. For Kant, the exercise of reason was never solely about information; it was about enabling people to become agents of their own destinies, and to resist domination. It was about building a ethical society grounded in the shared principle of rational discourse, rather than unquestioning acceptance.

With all the advantages AI brings, the paramount challenge is this: how can we harness its potential of superhuman intelligence without eroding human reasoning, 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 would do well not to outsource to the algorithm.