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This past summer, I was caught in congested traffic on the sweltering streets of a southern French city. At an intersection, my friend in the front seat advised a right turn toward a renowned spot for bouillabaisse. However, the digital guide on my phone instructed us to continue straight. Fatigued and in a stifling car, I followed the algorithm's advice. Minutes later, we were stranded at a roadwork site.

A seemingly trivial event, perhaps. But one that encapsulates a central question of our time, where digital tools touches almost every aspect of our lives: whom do we trust to a greater degree – other people and our personal instincts, or the algorithm?

The Enlightenment's Promise and A Contemporary Backslide

The renowned German philosopher Immanuel Kant famously described the Enlightenment as "man's release from its self-inflicted nonage." This state, he wrote, "is the incapacity to use one's personal reason without direction from an external source." For ages, that guiding "other" for human thought was frequently the clergyman, the king, or the feudal lord – entities purporting to speak for God's voice. To explain natural events like volcanic eruptions, people looked for explanations in theology. In shaping the fabric of society, from economics to love, faith acted as the primary guide.

“Sapere aude!” or “Dare to use your own understanding!”

Kant maintained that humans always possessed the ability to think rationally. They just didn't have the boldness to use it. With revolutions in America and France, a new dawn arrived: logic would replace superstition, and the intellect, freed from dogma, would become the engine of progress and a better world.

Now, two and a half centuries later, one might question if we are slipping back into a state of dependency. An app suggesting a direction is just one example. Artificial intelligence threatens to become our contemporary authority – a unseen overseer that influences our choices and behaviors. We risk relinquishing the hard-won autonomy to reason for ourselves – and this time, not to deities or rulers, but to lines of code.

The Swift Adoption and Hidden Risks of Algorithmic Reliance

ChatGPT debuted only in 2022, and already a global survey indicated that an overwhelming majority of people had engaged with artificial intelligence in the preceding half-year. Whether deciding on ending a relationship or choosing a candidate, individuals are looking to algorithms for counsel. Research suggests a large majority of user queries relate to non-work topics. Even more striking than our reliance on AI for judgment is what happens when we allow it express for us. Composition is now among the top uses for generative AI, just behind practical requests. The celebrated American author Joan Didion once remarked, “I write purely to find out what I am thinking.” What occurs when we cease writing? Do we lose that path?

Alarmingly, emerging research suggests the outcome may be affirmative. A study conducted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used brain monitoring to track the mental engagement of participants who had access to AI, Google, or nothing. Those who could rely on AI displayed the lowest cognitive engagement and had trouble accurately recalling their own work. Perhaps most troubling was that over time, participants in the AI group became progressively lazier, pasting entire blocks of text.

“Laziness and cowardice,” Kant wrote, “are the reasons why so many of men … stay in lifelong immaturity.”

Of course, AI's appeal lies in its efficiency. It is fast, minimizes work and – critically – offers a new method to offload responsibility. In his 1941 book, Escape from Freedom, the German psychoanalyst Erich Fromm proposed that the appeal of authoritarianism could be partly explained by a preference to surrender autonomy in for the sake of the reassuring certainty of subordination. AI offers a modern method of surrendering the burden of having to decide for oneself.

The Opacity Dilemma: Trust Without Understanding

AI's greatest allure is its ability to accomplish things beyond our minds – analyzing vast datasets at unprecedented speed. Sitting in the car in Marseille, this was, after all, why I opted to believe 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 thought.

The core issue is that AI operates as a black box. It generates answers, but without necessarily fostering human understanding. We cannot fully grasp the process behind its decisions – even its creators admit this. Nor can we verify its reasoning against transparent standards. So when we heed AI's advice, we are not being guided by reason. We are returning to the realm of belief. In dubio pro machina: when in doubt, side with the machine – that could be our 21st-century guiding principle.

Using Without Losing: The Essential Challenge

AI can be a powerful tool for mankind in rational inquiry. It can aid in medical research, free us from tedious tasks, or handle taxes – work that demand little thought 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. Critical thinking was not merely about efficiency – it was a discipline of freedom and human self-determination.

Human thought is often chaotic and fallible, but it compels us to argue, to doubt, to test ideas – and to acknowledge the boundaries of our own knowledge. It builds self-reliance, both individually and collectively. For Kant, the use of reason was never solely about acquiring knowledge; it was about empowering people to become agents of their own lives, and to resist control. It was about creating a moral community grounded in the common foundation of rational discourse, rather than blind belief.

With all the advantages AI offers, the paramount challenge is this: how can we leverage its potential of advanced capability without undermining human rationality, the bedrock of the Enlightenment and of liberal democracy itself? That is likely one of the defining questions of our century. It is a question we would do well not to outsource to the machine.