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This past summer, I was caught in gridlocked traffic on the scorching streets of a southern French city. At an intersection, my companion in the passenger seat advised a right turn toward a renowned spot for bouillabaisse. However, the navigation app on my phone instructed us to go forward. Weary and overheated, I followed the app's advice. Moments later, we were stuck at a roadwork site.

A minor event, perhaps. But one that encapsulates a central dilemma of our time, where technology touches almost every aspect of our lives: who gets our trust more – 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 immaturity, he argued, "represents the inability to use one's personal reason without guidance from an external source." For centuries, that directing force for society was frequently the clergyman, the king, or the landowner – entities purporting to speak for divine will. To explain phenomena like volcanic eruptions, people looked for explanations in religion. In organizing the fabric of society, from commerce to love, faith served as the main compass.

“Sapere aude!” or “Have courage to use your reason!”

Kant maintained that humans always possessed the ability to think rationally. They simply lacked the boldness to use it. With upheavals in America and France, a new dawn emerged: logic would replace blind faith, and the intellect, liberated from authority, would become the engine of advancement and a more ethical world.

Today, 250 years later, one might question if we are slipping back into a state of intellectual immaturity. An app suggesting a driving route is just one example. Artificial intelligence threatens to become our new "other" – a unseen guide that influences our choices and behaviors. We risk ceding the historically earned courage to think independently – and now, not to gods or kings, but to computer programs.

The Rapid Rise and Subtle Dangers of Algorithmic Reliance

ChatGPT debuted a mere three years ago, and yet a recent study found that an overwhelming majority of people had engaged with artificial intelligence in the previous six months. Whether deciding on ending a relationship or selecting a vote, individuals are increasingly turning to machines for guidance. Research suggests a large majority of user prompts concern personal life matters. Even more intriguing than our use of AI for judgment is what occurs when we let it express for us. Composition is now among the top uses for generative AI, just behind practical requests. The late American author Joan Didion famously said, “I write purely to find out what I am thinking.” What occurs when we cease writing? Do we cease discovering?

Worryingly, some evidence suggests the answer may be affirmative. A study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used electroencephalography to track the mental engagement of participants who had could use AI, Google, or no aids. Those who could use AI displayed the least brain activity and had trouble quoting their own work. Maybe most troubling was that over time, individuals in the AI group became progressively lazier, copying large sections of text.

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

Of course, AI's attraction lies in its convenience. It saves time, minimizes work and – importantly – offers a novel way to abdicate accountability. In his 1941 book, Escape from Freedom, the German psychoanalyst Erich Fromm argued that the rise of fascism could be understood by a preference to surrender autonomy in exchange for the reassuring certainty of subordination. AI presents a modern method of surrendering the weight of having to think and choose.

The Opacity Dilemma: Trust Without Understanding

AI's primary draw is its capacity to accomplish things beyond human capability – analyzing oceans of data at unprecedented speed. Sitting in the car in Marseille, this was, after all, why I chose to believe the machine over my friend (a decision she took as an affront). With access to all the data, surely the app must know best – or so I thought.

The fundamental problem is that AI operates as a opaque system. It generates knowledge, but without necessarily fostering human comprehension. We cannot fully grasp how AI reaches its conclusions – including its programmers admit this. Nor can we verify its logic against transparent standards. So when we heed 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, side with the machine – that could be our future credo.

Harnessing Without Eroding: The Essential Challenge

AI can be a formidable ally for mankind in scientific pursuit. It can help inventing drugs, free us from "bullshit jobs", or handle taxes – duties that demand little thought and are unfulfilling. This is beneficial. But Kant and his peers did not advocate for enlightenment just so humans could assemble better furniture or have extra free time. Critical thinking was not merely about efficiency – it was a discipline of freedom and human self-determination.

Human thought is inherently messy and fallible, but it forces us to argue, to doubt, to test ideas – and to recognize the limits of our own understanding. It builds confidence, both individually and collectively. For Kant, the exercise of reason was never solely about information; it was about enabling people to become agents of their own lives, and to resist domination. It was about building a ethical society grounded in the common foundation of reason and debate, rather than blind belief.

With all the advantages AI offers, the paramount challenge is this: how can we harness its promise of advanced capability without eroding human reasoning, the cornerstone of the Enlightenment and of liberal democracy themselves? 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.