Our New Sovereign, Our Digital Priest, Our Algorithmic Overlord – The Way AI Returns Us to the Medieval Era.

This past summer, I was caught in congested traffic on the sweltering streets of a southern French city. At a crossing, my friend in the passenger seat suggested a right turn toward a famous spot for fish soup. Yet, the digital guide on my phone commanded us to go forward. Weary and in a stifling car, I followed the algorithm's advice. Minutes later, we were stuck at a roadwork site.

A seemingly trivial incident, perhaps. But one that encapsulates a central question of our time, where technology touches almost every aspect of our lives: whom do we trust more – fellow humans and our own intuition, or the machine?

A Call for Intellectual Maturity and Our Modern Relapse

The influential German philosopher Immanuel Kant famously described the Enlightenment as "humanity's emergence from its self-imposed immaturity." This state, he argued, "represents the incapacity to use one's personal reason without direction from another." For ages, that guiding "other" for human thought was frequently the priest, the monarch, or the landowner – entities purporting to channel divine will. To comprehend natural events like volcanic eruptions, people looked for explanations in theology. In organizing the social world, from commerce to matters of the heart, faith acted as the primary guide.

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

Kant maintained that humans always possessed the capacity for reason. They just didn't have the confidence to employ it. With upheavals in the 18th century, a new dawn emerged: reason would supplant blind faith, and the human mind, liberated from authority, would become the engine of advancement and a more ethical world.

Today, two and a half centuries later, one might wonder if we are quietly regressing into a state of intellectual immaturity. An app suggesting a direction is merely the start. AI risks becoming our contemporary authority – a unseen guide that influences our decisions and behaviors. We risk relinquishing the hard-won courage to think independently – and now, not to gods or kings, but to lines of code.

The Rapid Rise and Hidden Risks of AI Dependence

ChatGPT debuted only in 2022, and already a global survey found that an overwhelming majority of people had engaged with artificial intelligence in the preceding half-year. Whether contemplating ending a relationship or selecting a vote, individuals are increasingly turning to machines for guidance. Research suggests a large majority of user prompts relate to personal life matters. Even more intriguing than our reliance on AI for judgment is what happens when we let it express for us. Writing is now among the top uses for tools like ChatGPT, just behind everyday tasks. The celebrated American author Joan Didion famously said, “I write entirely to discover what I am thinking.” What transpires when we stop composing? Do we lose that path?

Worryingly, some evidence suggests the answer may be yes. A study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used electroencephalography to observe the mental engagement of essay writers who had access to AI, traditional search engines, or no aids. Those who could rely on AI showed the least cognitive engagement and had trouble quoting their own work. Maybe most troubling was that over time, individuals in the AI group became progressively lazier, pasting entire blocks of text.

“Inertia and fear,” Kant wrote, “are the reasons why so many of men … remain in perpetual nonage.”

Certainly, AI's attraction stems from its convenience. It saves time, reduces effort and – importantly – offers a new method to offload responsibility. In his 1941 book, Escape from Freedom, the German psychoanalyst Erich Fromm argued that the rise of fascism could be partly explained by a preference to surrender personal freedom in exchange for the comforting security of subordination. AI presents a digital method of surrendering the weight of having to think and choose.

The Opacity Dilemma: Trust Without Understanding

AI's greatest allure 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 chose to believe the machine over my friend (a decision she interpreted as an insult). With knowledge of real-time information, surely the app had superior insight – or so I thought.

The core issue is that AI is a opaque system. It produces answers, but without necessarily deepening human understanding. 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 advice, we are not being led by logic. We are returning to the domain of belief. In dubio pro machina: when in doubt, trust the machine – that may become our 21st-century guiding principle.

Using Without Losing: The Essential Challenge

AI can be a powerful tool for humanity in scientific pursuit. It can help medical research, free us from "bullshit jobs", or handle administrative chores – work that demand little thought and are unfulfilling. This is beneficial. But Kant and his contemporaries did not advocate for enlightenment just so humans could optimize chores or have extra free time. Critical thinking was not merely about productivity – it was a practice of freedom and human self-determination.

Human thought is often chaotic and fallible, but it compels us to argue, to doubt, to challenge concepts – and to acknowledge the boundaries of our own knowledge. It fosters confidence, both personally and as a society. For Kant, the use of reason was never solely about information; it was about enabling people to become authors of their own lives, and to resist control. It was about creating a moral community based on the common foundation of reason and debate, rather than blind belief.

With all the undeniable benefits AI offers, the paramount challenge remains: how can we leverage its promise of superhuman intelligence without eroding human rationality, the bedrock of the Enlightenment and of liberal democracy itself? That may be one of the central dilemmas of our time. It is a question we must strive not to outsource to the algorithm.