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This past summer, I found myself navigating in gridlocked traffic on the sweltering streets of Marseille. At an intersection, my companion in the passenger seat advised a right turn toward a famous spot for bouillabaisse. However, the navigation app on my phone instructed us to continue straight. Weary and overheated, I followed the algorithm's directive. Moments later, we were stranded at a roadwork site.

A minor incident, perhaps. But one that captures a defining dilemma of our time, where technology touches almost every aspect of existence: whom do we trust to a greater degree – other people and our personal instincts, or the algorithm?

A Call for Intellectual Maturity and A Contemporary Backslide

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 direction from an external source." For centuries, that directing force for society was often the priest, the king, or the landowner – figures claiming to channel God's voice. To explain natural events like changing seasons, people looked for explanations in religion. In shaping the fabric of society, from commerce to love, religious doctrine served as the main compass.

“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 new dawn arrived: reason would replace superstition, and the intellect, 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 dependency. An app dictating a direction is just one example. AI threatens to become our new "other" – a silent guide that steers our choices and behaviors. We are in danger of ceding the hard-won courage to reason for ourselves – and now, 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 indicated that an vast number of people had engaged with artificial intelligence in the previous six months. Whether contemplating ending a relationship or choosing a candidate, individuals are looking to machines for guidance. Data suggests a large majority of user queries concern personal life matters. Even more striking than our reliance on AI for judgment is what happens when we let it speak for us. Writing is now one of the most common uses for tools like ChatGPT, second only to everyday tasks. The late American author Joan Didion once remarked, “I write purely to find out what I am thinking.” What occurs when we stop composing? Do we lose that path?

Worryingly, emerging research hints the outcome 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, Google, or no aids. Those who could rely on AI showed the least cognitive engagement and had trouble quoting their own work. Maybe most concerning was that over time, participants in the AI group grew increasingly reliant, copying large sections of text.

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

Of course, AI's appeal stems from 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 argued that the appeal of authoritarianism could be partly explained by a preference to surrender personal freedom in exchange for the comforting security of subordination. AI offers a modern avenue for surrendering the burden of having to decide for oneself.

The Black Box Problem: Faith Over Reason

AI's greatest allure is its ability to accomplish things beyond our minds – analyzing oceans of data at unprecedented speed. Sitting in the car in Marseille, this was, after all, why I opted to believe the app over my friend (a decision she took as an insult). With knowledge of all the data, certainly the algorithm must know best – or so I believed.

The fundamental problem is that AI operates as a black box. It produces answers, but without necessarily deepening human comprehension. We cannot fully grasp the process behind its conclusions – even its programmers admit this. Nor can we verify its reasoning against clear, objective criteria. So when we follow AI's advice, we are not being guided by reason. We are returning to the domain of belief. In dubio pro machina: when in doubt, side with the machine – that may become our 21st-century credo.

Harnessing Without Eroding: The Critical Balance

AI can be a powerful tool for humanity in scientific pursuit. It can aid in medical research, liberate us from "bullshit jobs", or handle administrative chores – duties that are repetitive and are unfulfilling. 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 self-determination.

Human thought is often chaotic and fallible, but it forces us to debate, to doubt, to challenge concepts – and to acknowledge the boundaries of our own understanding. It builds confidence, both personally and collectively. For Kant, the exercise of reason was never solely about information; it was about enabling people to become authors of their own destinies, and to oppose domination. It was about building a ethical society grounded in the shared principle of rational discourse, rather than unquestioning acceptance.

With all the undeniable benefits AI offers, the key question is this: how can we leverage its potential of advanced capability without eroding human rationality, the cornerstone of the Enlightenment and of free societies itself? That may be one of the central dilemmas of our century. It is a question we must strive not to delegate to the algorithm.