AI is Not the Enemy of Indepedent Thinking. But Refusing to Embrace it Might Be

I have a confession to make. I like artificial intelligence.

I use it, I appreciate it, and I find it fascinating. Sometimes it impresses me. Sometimes it frustrates me. And sometimes it gives me an answer so ridiculous that I wonder how something supposedly intelligent could have come up with it.

But here’s the important part: I don’t depend on it.

I still have my own opinions, my own ideas, my own experiences, and, thankfully, my own brain.

Yet I’ve noticed something interesting about the growing debate over AI. Some people seem almost offended by the fact that others find it useful.

Mention that you’ve used AI to research something, improve a piece of writing, or explore an idea, and you may find yourself defending your intelligence, creativity, or even your integrity.

Really?

When did using a tool become evidence that we’ve stopped thinking for ourselves?

We Love Technology. Until We Don’t.

There’s something rather amusing about our selective outrage over technology.

We happily use smartphones that do practically everything except make our morning coffee. We rely on GPS because we’ve forgotten how to read a map. We let spellcheck correct our spelling, calculators handle our arithmetic, and search engines find information we once spent hours looking for in libraries.

We stream movies, shop online, pay bills electronically, and communicate with people on the other side of the world in seconds.

And then artificial intelligence comes along, and suddenly using technology to make life easier is considered cheating.

Apparently, some forms of convenience are perfectly acceptable, while others are a threat to civilization.

Of course, AI presents challenges that earlier technologies didn’t. It can imitate human creativity, generate convincing misinformation, and potentially replace work that people depend on for their livelihoods.

Those concerns deserve serious attention.

But shouldn’t we distinguish between legitimate criticism and simply disliking something because it’s new, unfamiliar, or uncomfortable?

After all, rejecting a technology doesn’t automatically make us wiser than the people who use it.

Is Using AI Really Intellectual Laziness?

One criticism I hear is that AI makes people lazy.

Well, it certainly can.

So can television, social media, online shopping, and spending an entire afternoon watching videos of cats doing ridiculous things.

But I’ve never believed that a tool determines the intelligence of the person using it.

If I use a calculator, it doesn’t mean I can’t add.

If I use a dictionary, it doesn’t mean I have no vocabulary.

And if I ask AI to help me explore an idea, it doesn’t mean I no longer have ideas of my own.

There’s an enormous difference between using AI to support your thinking and allowing it to replace your thinking.

Personally, I enjoy being able to ask questions, challenge answers, and explore subjects from different perspectives.

Sometimes AI introduces an idea I hadn’t considered. Sometimes it helps me organize a complicated subject. Sometimes I disagree with it completely.

And that’s fine.

I don’t need it to agree with me. I need it to be useful.

The problem isn’t asking AI a question. The problem is accepting the answer without asking another one.

And What About Those Who Say AI Is Destroying Creativity?

As a writer, I understand this concern.

Writing is personal. It comes from experience, observation, imagination, emotion, and the desire to communicate something meaningful.

AI can produce paragraphs in seconds, but it hasn’t lived my life.

It hasn’t experienced my successes or failures, traveled the roads I’ve traveled, met the people who’ve influenced me, or learned the lessons I’ve learned.

Those experiences are mine.

And no matter how sophisticated AI becomes, I still have to decide what I believe, what I want to say, and whether the words accurately express my thoughts.

I can use AI as an editor, a research assistant, or a sounding board without surrendering my identity as a writer.

Does that mean every AI-assisted article is good? Absolutely not.

Some are dreadful.

They’re repetitive, impersonal, predictable, and filled with the sort of enthusiastic language that makes everything sound like a life-changing opportunity.

But let’s be fair. I’ve read plenty of dreadful writing produced entirely by humans.

The existence of bad writing isn’t exactly a new development.

The real question is whether the writer has something worth saying.

And whether they take responsibility for what they publish.

Perhaps We’re Asking the Wrong Question

Instead of asking whether AI is good or bad, perhaps we should be asking how we want to use it.

Because AI isn’t going to disappear simply because some people dislike it.

That doesn’t mean we should accept every development without question. Quite the opposite.

We need thoughtful conversations about privacy, copyright, employment, education, misinformation, environmental impact, and the increasing power of technology companies.

We also need to acknowledge that AI can make mistakes, invent information, and deliver completely incorrect answers with astonishing confidence.

Blind trust would be foolish.

But so would blind rejection.

I find it curious that some people are willing to form very strong opinions about AI without ever seriously exploring what it can and cannot do.

Imagine deciding that you hated books without ever opening one.

Or condemning the internet without ever visiting a website.

You might still decide that AI isn’t for you. That’s perfectly reasonable.

But at least make the decision from knowledge rather than assumption.

I’ve Lived Through Quite a Few Technological Revolutions

One of the advantages of getting older is perspective.

I’ve lived in a world without personal computers, smartphones, email, and the internet.

I’ve watched businesses transform, entire industries reinvent themselves, and technologies that once seemed extraordinary become ordinary parts of everyday life.

I remember when international communication was expensive and complicated. Today, we can speak face-to-face with someone thousands of miles away for practically nothing.

Would I want to return to the old days simply because the new technology came with problems?

Not particularly.

That doesn’t mean every change has been an improvement.

We’ve gained convenience, but sometimes lost privacy. We’ve gained access to information, but also created opportunities for misinformation. We’ve become more connected electronically, while sometimes becoming less connected personally.

Progress has never been a simple story of everything getting better.

But neither has resisting change been a guarantee of preserving what matters.

Perhaps one of the greatest advantages of having lived through so much change is recognizing that we don’t have to embrace everything or reject everything.

We can choose.

And we can keep learning.

You Don’t Have to Like AI

Let me make something clear.

I’m not suggesting everyone should use AI.

If you’re an artist who prefers to create everything by hand, wonderful.

If you’re a writer who enjoys every stage of the writing process without technological assistance, I respect that.

If you simply don’t want AI in your personal life, that’s your choice.

But shouldn’t that respect work both ways?

Why should someone who uses AI thoughtfully be considered less creative, less capable, or less authentic?

I don’t judge someone for preferring a handwritten letter to an email.

I wouldn’t criticize someone for using a washing machine instead of washing clothes by hand, either.

We all make choices about which tools improve our lives.

And those choices don’t have to become moral judgments about everyone else.

The Real Danger Is Giving Up Our Judgment

If there’s one thing about AI that genuinely concerns me, it’s the possibility that people will stop questioning what they’re told.

But that concern extends far beyond artificial intelligence.

We already live in a world where headlines are shared without articles being read, opinions are mistaken for facts, and information spreads faster than anyone can verify it.

AI may intensify those problems.

Which makes independent thinking more important than ever.

We need to remain curious, skeptical, and willing to challenge what we read, hear, and see.

We need to know when to seek professional advice, when to verify information, and when to trust our own experience.

Most importantly, we need to remember that having access to an answer isn’t the same as understanding it.

AI can help us gather information.

It cannot relieve us of the responsibility to think.

A Little Curiosity Never Hurt Anyone

I sometimes wonder whether our greatest challenge isn’t artificial intelligence at all.

Perhaps it’s our discomfort with change.

New ideas can threaten familiar ways of doing things. They can make us question skills we’ve spent years developing or force us to reconsider assumptions we’ve held for decades.

That’s not always pleasant.

But curiosity is one of the qualities that keeps life interesting.

And I would hate to reach an age where I decided there was nothing new worth learning.

I don’t want to be someone who rejects possibilities simply because they didn’t exist when I was younger.

Nor do I want to be someone who embraces every new invention without considering the consequences.

I’d rather remain somewhere in the middle: interested, questioning, open-minded, and perfectly capable of saying, “No, I don’t think that’s right.”

Even to artificial intelligence.

So Yes, I Like AI.

I like having another way to explore ideas, find information, improve my work, and satisfy my curiosity.

I appreciate its usefulness without believing it’s infallible.

I recognize its risks without assuming that everything associated with it must be harmful.

And I certainly don’t believe that using AI makes me less intelligent or less creative.

If anything, it reminds me how important it is to keep asking questions.

So to those who hate AI, I would simply suggest this:

You don’t have to love it.

You don’t have to use it.

You don’t even have to change your mind about it.

But perhaps it’s worth understanding before deciding that everyone who appreciates it has somehow surrendered their intelligence.

I like AI. I don’t depend on it. And I have no intention of allowing it to do my thinking for me.

After all, I’ve spent a lifetime developing my own mind.

I’m hardly going to hand it over to a chatbot now.