A lawyer accepts a summary instead of examining the relevant Court of Cassation decision. An engineer approves a result rather than checking the calculation. A journalist edits a text instead of verifying the story. In each case, a person takes a step back from exercising their own judgment.

We are living through a historical turning point in which labor, expertise, and professional skills are being redefined. Just as the Industrial Revolution transformed craftspeople into workers performing fragmented tasks, today’s knowledge workers are under similar pressure. Someone who once understood an entire job is reduced to a user managing a narrow part of the process. What will remain when that part, too, is handed over to automation?

As AI emerges from the work of some of the brightest minds, it also creates a large population that consumes its outputs without questioning them. If the prose flows well, the tone is convincing, and the answer comes easily, we are increasingly inclined to assume it must be correct. The greatest risk of generative AI is not simply that the system may make mistakes, but that people may lose their ability to scrutinize them.

The doctor surrendering judgment to a device, the manager to a dashboard, and the student to a ready-made essay are different expressions of the same problem. As the mindset spreads that “if AI did not find it, it does not exist; if it wrote it, it must be true; if it calculated it, it cannot be questioned,” human thinking retreats. Deteriorating handwriting, the loss of mental arithmetic, and declining patience for reading long texts are signs of an eroding cognitive foundation.

The question is how we use AI. A tool can expand human capabilities. The same tool can make us intellectually lazy and passive. Are we turning AI into an extension of our arms, or are we using it, metaphorically, to cut our arms off? The future will be shaped by how we answer that question.

Which occupations are under threat? A job and a profession are not the same thing. Established professions may be better equipped to protect themselves through professional organizations and norms. In less organized fields, technology may have far more disruptive effects. The future of AI is therefore not a concern only for engineers and entrepreneurs. Education policy, professional associations, public regulation, and social values are all part of the debate.

The most valuable skill in the age of AI is the ability to use it with critical judgment. Before asking how intelligent machines will become, we should ask whether people can preserve the depth of their own thinking. Ultimately, what will move society forward is our capacity to ask stronger questions and to keep responsibility for judgment in human hands.