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This past summer, I was caught in gridlocked traffic on the sweltering streets of a southern French city. At a crossing, my companion in the passenger seat suggested a right turn toward a renowned spot for fish soup. Yet, the navigation app on my phone commanded us to continue straight. Fatigued and in a stifling car, I followed the algorithm's advice. Minutes later, we were stuck at a roadwork site.

A seemingly trivial incident, maybe. But one that encapsulates a defining question of our time, where digital tools touches almost every aspect of existence: whom do we trust more – fellow humans and our personal instincts, or the algorithm?

The Enlightenment's Promise and Our Modern Relapse

The renowned German philosopher Immanuel Kant famously described the Enlightenment as "humanity's emergence from its self-inflicted immaturity." This state, he argued, "is the incapacity to use one's own understanding without guidance from an external source." For centuries, that directing force for society was often the priest, the monarch, or the landowner – figures purporting to speak for God's voice. To explain natural events like changing seasons, people sought answers in religion. In organizing the social world, from economics to love, faith served as the main compass.

“Sapere aude!” or “Dare to use your reason!”

Kant maintained that humans had the ability to think rationally. They just didn't have the confidence to employ it. With revolutions in the 18th century, a fresh era arrived: reason would supplant superstition, and the human mind, freed from authority, would become the engine of advancement and a more ethical 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 merely the start. Artificial intelligence threatens to become our contemporary authority – a silent overseer that influences our decisions and behaviors. We risk ceding the historically earned courage to reason for ourselves – and this time, not to deities or rulers, but to computer programs.

The Rapid Rise and Hidden Risks of Algorithmic Reliance

ChatGPT debuted only in 2022, and already a recent study found that an vast number of respondents had engaged with artificial intelligence in the previous six months. Whether contemplating a breakup or selecting a vote, individuals are looking to machines for guidance. Data suggests a large majority of user prompts relate to personal life matters. Even more intriguing than our use of AI for advice is what occurs when we let it express for us. Composition is now one of the top uses for tools like ChatGPT, just behind practical requests. The celebrated American author Joan Didion famously said, “I write purely to find out what I am thinking.” What occurs when we cease writing? Do we lose that path?

Worryingly, some evidence hints the outcome may be yes. A study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used electroencephalography to track the cognitive activity of participants who had access to AI, traditional search engines, or nothing. Those who could rely on AI showed the least cognitive engagement and had difficulty accurately recalling their own work. Maybe most troubling was that over time, participants in the AI group became increasingly reliant, pasting entire blocks of text.

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

Of course, AI's attraction stems from its efficiency. It is fast, reduces effort and – importantly – offers a novel way to abdicate responsibility. In his 1941 book, Escape from Freedom, the German psychoanalyst Erich Fromm proposed that the rise of fascism could be understood by a human tendency to surrender autonomy in for the sake of the comforting security of subordination. AI offers a digital method of surrendering the burden of having to decide for oneself.

The Opacity Dilemma: Trust Without Understanding

AI's primary draw is its ability to accomplish things outside our minds – analyzing vast datasets at unprecedented speed. Sitting in the car in Marseille, this was, after all, why I chose to believe the app over my companion (a choice she took as an insult). With access to all the data, certainly the app must know best – or so I believed.

The core issue is that AI operates as a black box. It generates knowledge, but not always fostering human understanding. We do not truly know how AI reaches its conclusions – including its creators acknowledge the opacity. Nor can we verify its logic against transparent standards. So when we heed AI's advice, 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 may become our future guiding principle.

Using Without Losing: The Critical Balance

AI can be a formidable ally for mankind in scientific pursuit. It can help inventing drugs, free us from "bullshit jobs", or manage administrative chores – duties that are repetitive and are unfulfilling. This is beneficial. But Kant and his peers did not champion enlightenment just so humans could assemble better furniture or have extra free time. Critical thinking was not just about productivity – it was a discipline of liberty and human self-determination.

Human thought is often chaotic and error-prone, but it forces us to debate, to question, to challenge concepts – and to acknowledge the boundaries of our own understanding. It builds confidence, both individually and collectively. For Kant, the exercise of reason was never solely about acquiring knowledge; it was about enabling people to become agents of their own lives, and to oppose control. It was about building a ethical society based on the shared principle of rational discourse, rather than unquestioning acceptance.

With all the undeniable benefits AI brings, the paramount challenge remains: how can we leverage its potential of superhuman intelligence without eroding human reasoning, the cornerstone of the Enlightenment and of liberal democracy itself? That may be one of the central dilemmas of our time. It is a question we would do well not to outsource to the machine.