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This past summer, I found myself navigating 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 famous spot for bouillabaisse. However, the navigation app on my phone commanded us to continue straight. Fatigued and overheated, I heeded the algorithm's directive. Moments later, we were stranded at a roadwork site.

A seemingly trivial event, maybe. But one that captures a central question of our era, where digital tools permeates nearly every facet of our lives: who gets our trust more – fellow humans and our personal instincts, or the machine?

The Enlightenment's Promise and Our Modern Relapse

The renowned German philosopher Immanuel Kant famously described the Enlightenment as "man's release from its self-imposed immaturity." This state, he argued, "is the incapacity to use one's own understanding without guidance from another." For ages, that directing force for society was frequently the priest, the king, or the landowner – entities claiming to speak for God's voice. To explain natural events like changing seasons, people sought answers in religion. In shaping the social world, from commerce to love, faith acted as the main compass.

“Sapere aude!” or “Have courage to use your reason!”

Kant argued that humans had the ability to think rationally. They just didn't have the boldness to use it. With upheavals in America and France, a new dawn emerged: logic would supplant superstition, and the intellect, freed from authority, would become the engine of progress and a better world.

Today, 250 years later, one might question if we are slipping back into a state of dependency. An app dictating a driving route is merely the start. Artificial intelligence threatens to become our new "other" – a unseen guide that influences our decisions and actions. We risk ceding the historically earned courage to reason for ourselves – and this time, not to deities or rulers, but to computer programs.

The Swift Adoption and Subtle Dangers of AI Dependence

ChatGPT was launched only in 2022, and already a recent study found that an vast number of people had engaged with artificial intelligence in the previous six months. Whether contemplating ending a relationship or selecting a vote, individuals are increasingly turning to machines for guidance. Research suggests a significant portion of user prompts concern non-work topics. Even more intriguing than our reliance on AI for advice is what happens when we allow it speak for us. Writing is now one of the most common uses for generative AI, second only to everyday tasks. The celebrated American author Joan Didion famously said, “I write purely to discover what I am thinking.” What transpires when we cease writing? Do we cease discovering?

Worryingly, emerging research suggests the answer may be yes. A study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used brain monitoring to track the cognitive activity of essay writers who had could use AI, traditional search engines, or nothing. Those who could use AI showed the least brain activity and had trouble accurately recalling their own work. Perhaps most troubling was that after a few months, individuals in the AI group grew progressively lazier, copying large sections of text.

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

Certainly, AI's appeal lies in its convenience. It saves time, 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 preference to surrender autonomy in exchange for the comforting security of obedience. AI presents a modern method of surrendering the burden of having to think and choose.

The Black Box Problem: Trust Without Understanding

AI's greatest allure is its ability to accomplish things beyond human capability – sifting through oceans of data at unprecedented speed. Sitting in the car in Marseille, this was, ultimately, why I opted to believe the app over my companion (a decision she took as an insult). With knowledge of real-time information, surely the app must know best – or so I thought.

The core issue is that AI is a black box. It generates knowledge, but without necessarily deepening human understanding. We cannot fully grasp the process behind its decisions – including its programmers admit this. Nor can we check its reasoning against transparent standards. So when we follow AI's advice, we are not being guided by reason. We are returning to the domain of faith. In dubio pro machina: when in doubt, trust the machine – that may become our 21st-century credo.

Harnessing Without Eroding: The Essential Challenge

AI can be a formidable ally for humanity in scientific pursuit. It can aid in inventing drugs, liberate us from tedious tasks, or handle administrative chores – work that demand little thought and are unfulfilling. This is beneficial. But Kant and his contemporaries did not advocate for reason over faith just so humans could assemble better furniture or have extra free time. Independent thought was not merely about productivity – it was a practice of liberty and human self-determination.

Human thought is often chaotic and fallible, but it forces us to debate, to doubt, to test ideas – and to acknowledge the boundaries of our own understanding. It builds confidence, both personally and collectively. For Kant, the use of reason was never only about information; it was about empowering people to become agents of their own lives, and to oppose domination. It was about building a moral community based on the common foundation of rational discourse, rather than unquestioning acceptance.

With all the undeniable benefits AI offers, the paramount challenge remains: how can we leverage its potential of advanced capability without undermining human rationality, the cornerstone of the Enlightenment and of free societies themselves? That may be one of the central dilemmas of our time. It is a question we must strive not to delegate to the machine.