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This recent season, I was caught in gridlocked traffic on the sweltering streets of a southern French city. At an intersection, 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. Weary and overheated, I heeded the app's advice. Minutes later, we were stranded at a construction site.

A minor event, maybe. But one that captures a defining dilemma of our era, where digital tools touches nearly every facet of our lives: who gets our trust to a greater degree – fellow humans and our own intuition, or the algorithm?

A Call for Intellectual Maturity and Our Modern Relapse

The renowned German philosopher Immanuel Kant once defined the Enlightenment as "man's release from its self-imposed nonage." This state, he wrote, "is the incapacity to use one's own understanding without guidance from an external source." For centuries, that guiding "other" for society was frequently the priest, the monarch, or the feudal lord – figures purporting to speak for God's voice. To explain phenomena like changing seasons, people sought answers in religion. In shaping the fabric of society, from commerce to love, faith served as the main compass.

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

Kant maintained that humans always possessed the capacity for reason. They simply lacked the boldness to use it. With upheavals in the 18th century, a new dawn arrived: reason would supplant blind faith, and the intellect, freed from authority, would become the driver of advancement and a better world.

Today, 250 years later, one might question if we are slipping back into a form of dependency. An app dictating a direction is merely the start. AI threatens to become our new "other" – a unseen overseer that steers our decisions and actions. We are in danger of relinquishing the hard-won autonomy to think independently – and now, not to deities or rulers, but to lines of code.

The Swift Adoption and Subtle Dangers of AI Dependence

ChatGPT was launched only in 2022, and yet a global survey indicated that an vast number of respondents had used AI in the previous six months. Whether contemplating a breakup or choosing a candidate, individuals are increasingly turning to algorithms for counsel. Data suggests a significant portion of user queries concern personal life matters. Even more striking than our use of AI for advice is what happens when we allow it express for us. Writing is now one of the top uses for generative AI, second only to practical requests. The celebrated American author Joan Didion once remarked, “I write purely to discover what I am thinking.” What transpires when we stop composing? Do we cease discovering?

Alarmingly, emerging research suggests the outcome may be yes. A study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used brain monitoring to track the mental engagement of essay writers who had access to AI, traditional search engines, or nothing. Those who could rely on AI displayed the least cognitive engagement and had difficulty quoting their own work. Maybe most concerning was that over time, individuals in the AI group grew increasingly reliant, pasting large sections of text.

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

Certainly, AI's appeal stems from its efficiency. It saves time, reduces effort and – importantly – 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 partly explained by a preference to give up personal freedom in exchange for the reassuring certainty of obedience. AI presents a modern method of surrendering the weight of having to think and choose.

The Black Box Problem: Faith Over Reason

AI's greatest allure is its capacity to accomplish things beyond our minds – analyzing vast datasets at lightning pace. Stuck in the car in Marseille, this was, ultimately, why I opted to trust the app over my companion (a choice she interpreted as an affront). With access to all the data, surely the algorithm had superior insight – or so I thought.

The core issue is that AI is a opaque system. It generates knowledge, but without necessarily deepening human understanding. We cannot fully grasp how AI reaches its conclusions – even its programmers admit this. Nor can we check its reasoning against clear, objective criteria. So when we heed AI's advice, we are not being led by logic. We are back in the realm of belief. In dubio pro machina: when in doubt, trust the machine – that may become our 21st-century credo.

Harnessing Without Eroding: The Critical Balance

AI can be a formidable ally for mankind in scientific pursuit. It can aid in inventing drugs, liberate us from "bullshit jobs", or handle taxes – duties that are repetitive and offer little satisfaction. All to the good. But Kant and his peers did not advocate for reason over faith just so humans could optimize chores or have extra free time. Independent thought was not merely about productivity – it was a practice of liberty and human emancipation.

Human thought is often chaotic and fallible, but it compels us to debate, to doubt, to test ideas – and to recognize the boundaries of our own knowledge. It builds self-reliance, both individually and collectively. For Kant, the exercise of reason was never only about information; it was about empowering people to become authors of their own lives, and to oppose control. It was about creating a ethical society based on the shared principle of rational discourse, rather than unquestioning acceptance.

With all the advantages AI offers, the key question 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 may be one of the central dilemmas of our time. It is a question we must strive not to outsource to the machine.