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This past summer, I was caught in gridlocked traffic on the scorching streets of a southern French city. At an intersection, my companion 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 go forward. Weary and in a stifling car, I followed the algorithm's advice. Minutes later, we were stranded at a construction site.

A minor event, maybe. But one that encapsulates a central question of our era, where digital tools touches almost every aspect of existence: who gets our trust to a greater degree – fellow humans and our personal instincts, or the machine?

A Call for Intellectual Maturity and Our Modern Relapse

The influential German philosopher Immanuel Kant famously described the Enlightenment as "man's release from its self-imposed nonage." This immaturity, he argued, "represents the incapacity to use one's own understanding without guidance from another." For ages, that directing force for society was frequently the priest, the monarch, or the feudal lord – figures purporting to channel divine will. To explain phenomena like changing seasons, people looked for explanations in theology. In organizing the fabric of society, from commerce to matters of the heart, faith served as the primary guide.

“Sapere aude!” or “Have courage to use your own understanding!”

Kant maintained that humans had the ability to think rationally. They simply lacked the boldness to use it. With revolutions in the 18th century, a new dawn arrived: logic would supplant blind faith, and the human mind, liberated from authority, would become the engine of advancement and a more ethical world.

Now, 250 years later, one might wonder if we are quietly regressing into a state of dependency. An app dictating a direction is just one example. AI risks becoming our contemporary authority – a unseen guide that influences our decisions and actions. We are in danger of relinquishing the hard-won autonomy to think independently – and now, not to gods or kings, but to computer programs.

The Swift Adoption and Hidden Risks of Algorithmic Reliance

ChatGPT debuted a mere three years ago, and already a recent study found that an overwhelming majority of people had engaged with artificial intelligence in the preceding half-year. Whether deciding on a breakup or selecting a vote, individuals are increasingly turning to machines for guidance. Data suggests a large majority of user queries concern non-work topics. Even more striking than our use of AI for judgment is what occurs when we let it express for us. Composition 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 entirely to discover what I am thinking.” What occurs when we stop composing? Do we lose that path?

Worryingly, some evidence suggests the answer may be yes. A study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used brain monitoring to track the cognitive activity of participants who had access to AI, Google, or no aids. Those who could rely on AI displayed the least cognitive engagement and had trouble quoting their own work. Perhaps most troubling was that over time, individuals in the AI group grew increasingly reliant, copying entire blocks of text.

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

Certainly, AI's appeal lies in its convenience. It saves time, reduces effort and – critically – offers a novel way to abdicate accountability. 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 exchange for the reassuring certainty of subordination. AI presents a digital avenue for relinquishing the burden of having to decide for oneself.

The Opacity Dilemma: Faith Over Reason

AI's primary draw is its ability to perform tasks outside human capability – sifting through oceans of data at lightning pace. Sitting in the car in Marseille, this was, ultimately, why I opted to trust the app over my companion (a decision she interpreted as an affront). With knowledge of all the data, certainly the app had superior insight – or so I believed.

The fundamental problem is that AI operates as a opaque system. It produces knowledge, but not always deepening human comprehension. We cannot fully grasp how AI reaches its conclusions – even its creators admit this. Nor can we check its logic against clear, objective criteria. So when we follow AI's advice, we are not being led by logic. We are returning to the realm of faith. In dubio pro machina: when in doubt, trust the machine – that could be our future credo.

Using Without Losing: The Critical Balance

AI can be a formidable ally for mankind in scientific pursuit. It can aid in medical research, liberate us from "bullshit jobs", or manage taxes – duties that are repetitive and are unfulfilling. All to the good. But Kant and his contemporaries did not advocate for reason over faith just so humans could optimize chores or have more leisure. Independent thought was not merely 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 doubt, to challenge concepts – and to recognize the limits of our own understanding. It fosters self-reliance, both individually and collectively. For Kant, the use of reason was never solely about information; it was about enabling people to become authors of their own lives, and to resist domination. It was about building a ethical society based on the common foundation of rational discourse, rather than blind belief.

With all the advantages AI brings, the paramount challenge remains: how can we leverage its promise of superhuman intelligence without eroding human rationality, the bedrock of the Enlightenment and of free societies themselves? That is likely one of the defining questions of our century. It is a question we must strive not to delegate to the machine.