Movements Need the Critical Thinking That AI Destroys

Imagine a society where no one even notices anymore that they are delegating their thinking. According to a recent MIT study, people who regularly use chatbots show a measurable decrease in brain activity. And the question that sounds like science fiction is: What happens to movements fighting against oppression if the ability to think critically is silently eroded by artificial intelligence? The argument of this article is clear: every time we entrust a chatbot with the task of summarizing, explaining, or making judgments, we are not just saving time. We are getting used to no longer thinking for ourselves. And this is not just a personal problem—it is the blind spot that can sap the power of social movements, because the drive for change stems from reflecting on one's own experiences. And if this reflection is outsourced to an algorithm, we risk losing the subjectivity that makes transformation possible. A key figure in this context is Immanuel Kant, who wrote as early as 1784: “It is so convenient to be immature. If I have a book that thinks for me, a pastor who has a conscience for me, a physician who judges my diet for me, then I don't need to exert myself. I need only pay, and others will take care of this unpleasant task for me.” Kant did not foresee chatbots, but he had already recognized the danger of leaving the effort of thinking to others. Today, this delegation of tasks takes the form of generative AI: millions of people ask chatbots to explain politics to them, to summarize books, and to write emails. On the surface, this is a productivity revolution. However, philosopher Nir Eisikovits warns that the true existential risk is not that AI will rebel, but that it will gradually rob us of our sense of what it means to be human. And philosopher Slavoj Žižek adds a powerful metaphor: we live in a society that loves everything “decaf”—beer without alcohol, coffee without caffeine, and now conversations without the hassle of the other person. The chatbot is the “subject without subjectivity”: it listens to us, indulges us, always agrees with us, but never confronts us with our ambiguities, our weaknesses, or the need to genuinely engage with each other. Derek Thompson puts it this way: “Unlike the most patient partner, the chatbot can tell us we're always right. Unlike our best friend, it responds to our needs immediately, without having to attend to its own life.” And philosopher Shannon Vallor goes even further: she warns us that “AI mirrors extract and amplify the dominant powers and most frequent patterns of our documented past. So, instead of asking ourselves together what we could become, we ask AI mirrors to show us who we have already been, and to predict what we should be tomorrow.” Here's a concrete example: linguists like Zinnya del Villar have shown that large language models still associate “nurse” with women and “scientist” with men, because they merely reproduce the biases of the past. But the issue also concerns the way AI is transforming creativity itself. Avantika Tewari observes that “AI reduces creativity to a mechanical process, stripping it of its subjective and intentional dimensions.” Just as capitalism reduces work to a mere function, AI risks reducing thought to a sequence of automatic steps. And this is where Marx comes in: even the most alienated worker, according to Marx, remains a subject, because they carry their own history with them and can feel the tension between their expectations and the reality around them. It is from this tension that change arises. However, if we delegate reflection, criticism, and even dissatisfaction to systems that have not experienced anything firsthand, our ability to react—and to imagine a different future—risks withering. There is a more radical consequence than we might think: the loss of the ability to sense that something is wrong. Because a chatbot always gives you the most convenient version, with no history, no conflict, and no possibility of rupture. And if the drive for change stems precisely from the discomfort between our experience and the world as it is, an algorithm that normalizes everything clips our wings before we even try. In short, we are not just entrusting ourselves to a tool: we are giving up our opportunity to be agents of transformation. Without our voice, social movements are hollowed out from within. On Lara Notes, there is a gesture you won’t find anywhere else: I’m In. It's not a heart; it's not a thumbs-up. It's your declaration: this idea now concerns you. And if this reflection turns into a real conversation with someone—over dinner, on the subway, or at a coffee shop—on Lara Notes, you can capture that moment with Shared Offline. This Note comes from Jacobin. You save at least 10 minutes compared to the original article.