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This past summer, I found myself navigating in gridlocked traffic on the scorching streets of Marseille. At an intersection, my companion in the passenger seat advised a right turn toward a famous spot for bouillabaisse. Yet, the digital guide on my phone instructed us to continue straight. Fatigued and overheated, I heeded the app's directive. Minutes later, we were stranded at a construction site.

A seemingly trivial event, maybe. But one that captures a central question of our time, where technology permeates nearly every facet of existence: who gets our trust more – other people and our personal instincts, or the algorithm?

The Enlightenment's Promise and Our Modern Relapse

The influential German philosopher Immanuel Kant famously described the Enlightenment as "man's release from its self-inflicted immaturity." This immaturity, he argued, "is the inability to use one's personal reason without guidance from another." For ages, that guiding "other" for society was often the clergyman, the monarch, or the feudal lord – figures claiming to channel God's voice. To explain phenomena like changing seasons, people sought answers in theology. In shaping the social world, from commerce to love, religious doctrine acted as the primary guide.

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

Kant maintained that humans had the ability to think rationally. They just didn't have the boldness to use it. With upheavals in the 18th century, a new dawn arrived: reason would replace blind faith, and the human mind, liberated from dogma, would become the driver of progress and a more ethical world.

Now, two and a half centuries later, one might question if we are slipping back into a state of intellectual immaturity. An app suggesting a direction is just one example. AI risks becoming our contemporary authority – a unseen overseer that steers our choices and actions. We risk relinquishing the historically earned courage to think independently – and now, not to deities or rulers, but to computer programs.

The Swift Adoption and Subtle Dangers of Algorithmic Reliance

ChatGPT was launched only in 2022, and yet a global survey indicated that an vast number of respondents had engaged with artificial intelligence in the preceding half-year. Whether contemplating ending a relationship or choosing a candidate, individuals are increasingly turning to algorithms for counsel. Data suggests a large majority of user prompts concern personal life matters. Even more striking than our reliance on AI for advice is what happens when we allow it speak for us. Composition is now among the top uses for tools like ChatGPT, just behind practical requests. The celebrated American author Joan Didion famously said, “I write entirely to find out what I am thinking.” What occurs when we cease writing? Do we lose that path?

Alarmingly, some evidence hints the outcome may be yes. A study conducted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used electroencephalography to observe the cognitive activity of essay writers who had could use AI, Google, or no aids. Those who could use AI displayed the lowest cognitive engagement and had difficulty accurately recalling their own work. Perhaps most troubling was that after a few months, individuals in the AI group became increasingly reliant, pasting large sections of text.

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

Of course, AI's attraction stems from its efficiency. It saves time, minimizes work and – importantly – offers a new method to offload 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 preference to give up personal freedom in for the sake of the comforting security of subordination. AI presents a modern avenue for surrendering the burden of having to think and choose.

The Opacity Dilemma: Trust Without Understanding

AI's greatest allure is its capacity to perform tasks beyond human capability – analyzing oceans of data at unprecedented speed. Stuck in the car in Marseille, this was, after all, why I chose to believe the app over my friend (a choice she interpreted as an affront). With knowledge of real-time information, surely the algorithm must know best – or so I thought.

The fundamental problem is that AI operates as a opaque system. It produces answers, but without necessarily fostering human understanding. We do not truly know the process behind its decisions – even its creators admit this. Nor can we check its reasoning against transparent standards. So when we follow AI's advice, we are not being led by logic. We are returning to the realm of belief. In dubio pro machina: when in doubt, side with the machine – that may become our future guiding principle.

Harnessing Without Eroding: The Critical Balance

AI can be a formidable ally for mankind in scientific pursuit. It can aid in medical research, liberate us from tedious tasks, or handle taxes – work that are repetitive and offer little satisfaction. This is beneficial. But Kant and his contemporaries did not advocate for reason over faith just so humans could optimize chores or have extra free time. Independent thought was not just about efficiency – it was a practice of liberty and human emancipation.

Human thought is inherently messy and error-prone, but it compels us to debate, to doubt, to challenge concepts – and to acknowledge the limits of our own understanding. It builds confidence, both personally and as a society. For Kant, the exercise of reason was never solely about acquiring knowledge; it was about empowering people to become authors of their own lives, and to oppose control. It was about creating a moral community grounded in the shared principle of rational discourse, rather than unquestioning acceptance.

With all the undeniable benefits AI brings, the paramount challenge is this: how can we harness its promise of superhuman intelligence without undermining human rationality, the bedrock of the Enlightenment and of liberal democracy themselves? That may be one of the central dilemmas of our century. It is a question we must strive not to delegate to the machine.