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This recent season, I found myself navigating in gridlocked traffic on the scorching streets of a southern French city. At a crossing, my companion in the front seat advised a right turn toward a renowned spot for bouillabaisse. Yet, the digital guide on my phone commanded us to continue straight. Weary and overheated, I followed the algorithm's directive. Moments later, we were stranded at a roadwork site.

A seemingly trivial incident, maybe. But one that captures a defining dilemma of our era, where technology permeates nearly every facet of our lives: whom do we trust to a greater degree – fellow humans and our personal instincts, or the machine?

A Call for Intellectual Maturity and A Contemporary Backslide

The influential German philosopher Immanuel Kant once defined the Enlightenment as "humanity's emergence from its self-inflicted nonage." 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 society was often the clergyman, the monarch, or the feudal lord – figures purporting to speak for divine will. To comprehend natural events like changing seasons, people looked for explanations in religion. In shaping the fabric of society, from economics to love, 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 employ it. With revolutions in the 18th century, a new dawn emerged: logic would replace blind faith, and the human mind, liberated from dogma, would become the engine of advancement and a better world.

Today, 250 years later, one might question if we are quietly regressing into a state of dependency. An app suggesting a direction is merely the start. Artificial intelligence risks becoming our new "other" – a silent guide that influences our choices and behaviors. We risk ceding the hard-won autonomy to reason for ourselves – 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 global survey indicated that an vast number of respondents had engaged with artificial intelligence in the preceding half-year. Whether contemplating a breakup or selecting a vote, individuals are increasingly turning to algorithms for guidance. Data suggests a large majority of user queries relate to non-work topics. Even more intriguing than our use of AI for advice is what occurs when we allow it express for us. Composition is now among the top uses for generative AI, just behind everyday tasks. The celebrated American author Joan Didion famously said, “I write purely to find out what I am thinking.” What transpires when we stop composing? Do we cease discovering?

Worryingly, emerging research hints the answer may be yes. A study conducted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used electroencephalography to track the cognitive activity of essay writers who had access to AI, Google, or nothing. Those who could rely on AI displayed the lowest cognitive engagement and had difficulty accurately recalling their own work. Perhaps most troubling was that after a few months, participants in the AI group became increasingly reliant, pasting large sections of text.

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

Certainly, AI's attraction stems from its efficiency. It is fast, minimizes work and – critically – offers a new method to offload accountability. In his 1941 book, Escape from Freedom, the German psychoanalyst Erich Fromm proposed that the rise of fascism could be understood by a preference to surrender personal freedom in exchange for the comforting security of obedience. AI presents a modern avenue for relinquishing the weight of having to think and choose.

The Black Box Problem: Trust Without Understanding

AI's greatest allure is its capacity to perform tasks beyond human capability – analyzing oceans of data at lightning pace. Stuck in the car in Marseille, this was, ultimately, why I chose to trust the machine over my friend (a decision she interpreted as an insult). With knowledge of real-time information, surely the app must know best – or so I thought.

The fundamental problem is that AI is a black box. It produces knowledge, but not always fostering human understanding. We do not truly know how AI reaches its conclusions – even its programmers acknowledge the opacity. Nor can we verify its logic against transparent standards. So when we follow AI's recommendation, 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 guiding principle.

Harnessing Without Eroding: The Essential Challenge

AI can be a powerful tool for mankind in scientific pursuit. It can help medical research, liberate us from tedious tasks, or handle taxes – duties that demand little thought and are unfulfilling. All to the good. But Kant and his peers did not advocate for reason over faith just so humans could assemble better furniture or have more leisure. Independent thought was not just about efficiency – it was a practice of freedom and human self-determination.

Human thought is often chaotic and error-prone, but it compels us to argue, to question, to challenge concepts – and to recognize the limits of our own understanding. It fosters self-reliance, both personally and as a society. For Kant, the exercise of reason was never only about acquiring knowledge; it was about empowering people to become authors of their own destinies, and to oppose domination. It was about creating a ethical society based on the common foundation of rational discourse, rather than blind belief.

With all the advantages AI offers, the paramount challenge is this: how can we harness 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 defining questions of our time. It is a question we must strive not to delegate to the algorithm.