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This recent season, I found myself navigating in gridlocked traffic on the sweltering streets of Marseille. At an intersection, my companion in the passenger seat suggested a right turn toward a renowned spot for bouillabaisse. Yet, the digital guide on my phone commanded us to go forward. Weary and in a stifling car, I heeded the app's advice. Moments later, we were stranded at a construction site.

A minor event, perhaps. But one that captures a central dilemma of our time, where digital tools permeates nearly every facet 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 Our Modern Relapse

The influential German philosopher Immanuel Kant once defined the Enlightenment as "humanity's emergence from its self-imposed immaturity." This immaturity, he argued, "is the incapacity to use one's personal reason without direction from an external source." For ages, that guiding "other" for human thought was often the priest, the monarch, or the feudal lord – entities purporting to channel divine will. To comprehend phenomena like volcanic eruptions, people sought answers in theology. In shaping the social world, from economics to matters of the heart, faith acted as the primary guide.

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

Kant argued 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 new dawn arrived: reason would supplant superstition, and the human mind, liberated from authority, would become the engine of progress and a better world.

Now, 250 years later, one might question if we are slipping back into a state of intellectual immaturity. An app suggesting a driving route is merely the start. AI threatens to become our new "other" – a silent guide that influences our choices and behaviors. We risk ceding the hard-won courage to think independently – and now, not to deities or rulers, but to computer programs.

The Rapid Rise and Hidden Risks of Algorithmic Reliance

ChatGPT debuted a mere three years ago, and yet a global survey found that an overwhelming majority of people had used AI in the preceding half-year. Whether contemplating ending a relationship or choosing a candidate, individuals are looking to algorithms for guidance. Research suggests a large majority of user queries concern personal life matters. Even more striking than our use of AI for advice is what occurs when we allow it speak for us. Composition is now one of the most common uses for tools like ChatGPT, second only to practical requests. The celebrated American author Joan Didion once remarked, “I write purely to discover what I am thinking.” What occurs when we cease writing? Do we lose that path?

Worryingly, emerging research suggests the answer may be yes. A study conducted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used brain monitoring to observe the mental engagement of participants who had could use AI, Google, or no aids. Those who could rely on AI showed the least cognitive engagement and had difficulty quoting their own work. Maybe most concerning was that after a few months, participants in the AI group became increasingly reliant, copying 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 appeal lies in its convenience. It is fast, reduces effort and – critically – 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 partly explained by a human tendency to give up personal freedom in exchange for the reassuring certainty of obedience. AI offers a digital avenue for surrendering the weight of having to think and choose.

The Opacity Dilemma: Faith Over Reason

AI's primary draw is its ability to accomplish things beyond human capability – sifting through oceans of data at unprecedented speed. Stuck in the car in Marseille, this was, ultimately, why I opted to believe the app over my companion (a choice she took as an insult). With knowledge of all the data, surely the algorithm had superior insight – or so I thought.

The core issue is that AI is a black box. It produces knowledge, but without necessarily deepening human comprehension. We do not truly know how AI reaches its decisions – including its programmers acknowledge the opacity. Nor can we verify its reasoning against clear, objective criteria. So when we heed AI's advice, we are not being guided by reason. We are back in the realm of faith. In dubio pro machina: when in doubt, trust the machine – that may become our 21st-century credo.

Harnessing Without Eroding: The Essential Challenge

AI can be a formidable ally for humanity in scientific pursuit. It can help inventing drugs, free us from tedious tasks, or manage taxes – work that demand little thought and offer little satisfaction. This is beneficial. But Kant and his contemporaries did not advocate for enlightenment just so humans could assemble better furniture or have extra free time. Independent thought was not just about productivity – it was a practice of liberty and human self-determination.

Human thought is often chaotic and error-prone, but it forces us to debate, to doubt, to test ideas – and to acknowledge the boundaries of our own understanding. It builds confidence, both individually and as a society. 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 resist domination. It was about building a ethical society grounded in the shared principle of reason and debate, rather than blind belief.

With all the advantages AI offers, the paramount challenge is this: how can we leverage its promise of superhuman intelligence without eroding human rationality, the cornerstone of the Enlightenment and of liberal democracy themselves? That is likely one of the defining questions of our century. It is a question we would do well not to outsource to the algorithm.