For a moment, let’s get technical. Cognitive skills are basically your brain’s default settings: memory, attention, perception, and reasoning. Critical thinking, which is basically the capacity to examine information and ask yourself, “Hang on, is this actually true, or is someone messing with me?” is fueled by these.

You learn these skills the old-fashioned way, by making mistakes repeatedly. By making poor choices, taking incorrect turns, and picking up lessons from the spectacular mistakes of others. Lifting heavy objects until you lose feeling in your arms is the educational equivalent of gaining muscle.

This is where AI throws a wrench in the plans, though.

When you ask AI a question, it provides clear and organized answers that are rarely incorrect, or at least seem convincingly right, which is almost the same thing. Your brain, being naturally lazy, sorry, efficient, looks at this situation and thinks, “Great! I’ll just let AI handle all this boring thinking.” 

This is called cognitive offloading, and it is just as concerning as it sounds. Your brain stops putting in the effort because why would it? AI does the hard work. You get perfect results without the complicated process of actually thinking. 

You’ve won the battle. But you’re losing the war.