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This past summer, I found myself navigating in congested traffic on the scorching streets of Marseille. At a crossing, my companion in the front seat suggested a right turn toward a famous spot for fish soup. Yet, the digital guide on my phone instructed us to continue straight. Fatigued and overheated, I heeded the app's advice. Moments later, we were stranded at a construction site.

A seemingly trivial event, maybe. But one that captures a central dilemma of our time, where digital tools permeates almost every aspect of existence: whom do we trust to a greater degree – fellow humans and our own intuition, or the algorithm?

The Enlightenment's Promise and Our Modern Relapse

The influential German philosopher Immanuel Kant once defined the Enlightenment as "man's release from its self-imposed immaturity." This state, 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 often the clergyman, the king, or the feudal lord – entities purporting to channel God's voice. To explain natural events like changing seasons, people looked for explanations in theology. In organizing the social world, from economics to matters of the heart, religious doctrine served as the primary guide.

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

Kant maintained that humans always possessed the capacity for reason. They just didn't have the confidence to use it. With upheavals in the 18th century, a fresh era emerged: logic would replace blind faith, and the human mind, freed from authority, would become the driver of progress and a better world.

Now, two and a half centuries later, one might wonder if we are quietly regressing into a state of intellectual immaturity. An app dictating a driving route is just one example. AI risks becoming our new "other" – a silent overseer that steers our choices and behaviors. We are in danger of relinquishing the historically earned courage 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 debuted a mere three years ago, and already a global survey indicated that an vast number of people had used AI in the previous six months. Whether deciding on ending a relationship or selecting a vote, 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 reliance on AI for advice is what happens when we let it express for us. Writing is now among the most common uses for tools like ChatGPT, second only to practical requests. The late 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?

Alarmingly, emerging research hints the answer may be yes. A study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used brain monitoring to observe the mental engagement of participants who had access to AI, traditional search engines, or nothing. Those who could rely on AI showed the least brain activity and had difficulty quoting their own work. Perhaps most concerning was that after a few months, participants in the AI group became increasingly reliant, pasting large sections of text.

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

Of course, AI's appeal lies in its efficiency. 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 argued that the appeal of authoritarianism could be understood by a human tendency to give up autonomy in exchange for the comforting security of subordination. AI offers a digital method of surrendering the burden of having to think and choose.

The Black Box Problem: Faith Over Reason

AI's greatest allure is its ability to perform tasks outside 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 friend (a choice she interpreted as an insult). With knowledge of all the data, surely the algorithm had superior insight – or so I thought.

The fundamental problem is that AI operates as a opaque system. It generates answers, but not always fostering human understanding. We do not truly know the process behind its decisions – even its creators acknowledge the opacity. Nor can we check its logic against transparent standards. So when we follow AI's recommendation, we are not being guided by reason. We are back in the domain of belief. In dubio pro machina: when in doubt, trust the machine – that could be our 21st-century credo.

Harnessing Without Eroding: The Critical Balance

AI can be a powerful tool for mankind in rational inquiry. It can help inventing drugs, liberate us from "bullshit jobs", or handle taxes – duties that demand little thought and offer little satisfaction. This is beneficial. But Kant and his peers did not advocate for reason over faith just so humans could assemble better furniture or have extra free time. Critical thinking was not merely about efficiency – it was a practice of freedom and human self-determination.

Human thought is inherently messy and fallible, but it forces us to debate, to doubt, to challenge concepts – and to acknowledge the boundaries of our own understanding. It builds self-reliance, both personally and collectively. For Kant, the exercise of reason was never only about information; it was about enabling people to become agents of their own destinies, and to resist control. It was about creating a moral community based on the common foundation of rational discourse, rather than blind belief.

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 is likely one of the defining questions of our time. It is a question we would do well not to outsource to the machine.