Our King, Our Priest, Our Feudal Lord – The Way AI Returns Us to the Medieval Era.

This recent season, I found myself navigating in congested traffic on the scorching streets of Marseille. At a crossing, my friend in the passenger seat suggested 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 heeded the algorithm's directive. Moments later, we were stranded at a construction site.

A minor incident, perhaps. But one that encapsulates a defining dilemma of our era, where digital tools permeates nearly every facet of existence: who gets our trust more – fellow humans and our personal instincts, or the machine?

The Enlightenment's Promise and A Contemporary Backslide

The influential German philosopher Immanuel Kant once defined the Enlightenment as "humanity's emergence from its self-imposed immaturity." This state, he argued, "is the incapacity to use one's own understanding without guidance from an external source." For ages, that directing force for society was often the priest, the monarch, or the feudal lord – figures claiming to speak for divine will. To comprehend phenomena like volcanic eruptions, people sought answers in religion. In organizing the fabric of society, from economics to love, religious doctrine acted as the primary guide.

“Sapere aude!” or “Have courage to use your own understanding!”

Kant maintained that humans had the capacity for reason. They simply lacked the confidence to employ it. With upheavals in America and France, a fresh era arrived: reason would replace superstition, 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 intellectual immaturity. An app dictating a direction is merely the start. Artificial intelligence threatens to become our new "other" – a silent overseer that influences our decisions and behaviors. We are in danger of ceding the historically earned autonomy to think independently – and this time, not to gods or kings, but to lines of code.

The Rapid Rise and Hidden Risks of AI Dependence

ChatGPT debuted a mere three years ago, and already a global survey found that an vast number of respondents had engaged with artificial intelligence in the previous six months. Whether contemplating a breakup or choosing a candidate, individuals are increasingly turning to machines for guidance. Research suggests a significant portion of user queries concern personal life matters. Even more intriguing than our reliance on AI for judgment 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 late 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?

Alarmingly, emerging research hints the answer may be yes. A study conducted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used brain monitoring to track the mental engagement of participants who had could use AI, traditional search engines, or nothing. Those who could use AI displayed the lowest cognitive engagement and had difficulty quoting their own work. Perhaps most troubling was that over time, individuals in the AI group became increasingly reliant, pasting entire blocks of text.

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

Certainly, AI's appeal lies in its convenience. It saves time, minimizes work 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 give up personal freedom in for the sake of the comforting security of obedience. AI offers a digital method of relinquishing the weight of having to decide for oneself.

The Black Box Problem: Trust Without Understanding

AI's primary draw is its capacity to accomplish things beyond our minds – sifting through oceans of data at unprecedented speed. Stuck in the car in Marseille, this was, after all, why I chose to believe the machine over my companion (a decision she took as an affront). With access to real-time information, surely the algorithm had superior insight – or so I thought.

The core issue is that AI is a opaque system. It generates knowledge, but not always deepening human comprehension. We do not truly know how AI reaches its decisions – including its creators admit this. Nor can we check its logic against clear, objective criteria. So when we heed AI's recommendation, we are not being guided by reason. We are returning to the domain of faith. In dubio pro machina: when in doubt, trust the machine – that may become our 21st-century guiding principle.

Harnessing Without Eroding: The Critical Balance

AI can be a formidable ally for mankind in rational inquiry. It can aid in inventing drugs, free us from tedious tasks, or manage administrative chores – duties that are repetitive and offer little satisfaction. All to the good. But Kant and his contemporaries did not advocate for enlightenment just so humans could assemble better furniture or have more leisure. Critical thinking was not just about productivity – it was a practice of freedom and human emancipation.

Human thought is inherently messy and fallible, but it compels us to debate, to question, to test ideas – and to acknowledge the limits 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 destinies, and to resist domination. It was about building a moral community based on the shared principle of rational discourse, rather than blind belief.

With all the undeniable benefits AI offers, the key question is this: how can we harness its promise of advanced capability without eroding human reasoning, the bedrock of the Enlightenment and of free societies itself? That is likely one of the central dilemmas of our century. It is a question we would do well not to delegate to the machine.