Use artificial intelligence in such a way that your thinking ability does not diminish.

 Use artificial intelligence in such a way that your thinking ability does not diminish.

Many studies have shown that excessive use of Artificial Intelligence is having a negative impact on our thinking ability i.e. critical thinking.

Now the use of Artificial Intelligence i.e. AI is continuously increasing in our everyday life.

Whether you want to find the answer to any question or information on the Internet, write an email or listen to a song, Artificial Intelligence is being used in all these. Based on this, our computer gives us information immediately through algorithms.

It definitely makes our work easier, but are we becoming overly dependent on it? Have we started using our critical thinking, i.e. our ability to think deeply on a subject, less and this ability of ours is becoming weaker?

Is our confidence also decreasing? Many studies show that this is having a negative impact on our ability to think critically.

In a study by MIT's Media Lab, some people were asked to write an essay. Some of them used AI for this, while others did not.

It showed that people who used AI to write essays became more lazy while writing the next essay.

So this week in the world we will try to understand whether Artificial Intelligence is destroying our critical thinking ability?

What is critical thinking?

Critical thinking means evaluating all aspects of a subject objectively and taking decisions. That means, instead of blindly accepting something, consider all its aspects. We use this ability to solve problems.

Dr. Daniel Willingham, professor of psychology at the University of Virginia, America, says that we often decide something not on the basis of critical thinking but on the basis of our memory.

He says, "Actually, we often depend on our past experiences or memory to find the solution to a problem. But many times we face a problem which has arisen before us for the first time. That is, we cannot solve it on the basis of our memory. In such a situation, our critical thinking comes to the fore."

"Memory is important and many times we have successfully solved problems with its help. However, even with critical thinking, sometimes problems are not easily solved."

When we solve a problem, it gets recorded in our memory and next time we solve the same challenge on the basis of previous experience.

Critical thinking resides in the front part of the brain called the prefrontal cortex, while memory is stored elsewhere. That part is called hippocampus. Due to excessive work, toxins accumulate in the prefrontal cortex due to which we feel tired.

According to Dr. Daniel Willingham, it is because of this fatigue that we prefer to rely on our memory instead of critical thinking. This makes work easier but we are deprived of learning new ways to solve problems.

By solving problems in the same way, we stop using our brain. Critical thinking not only stresses the brain, but also makes it sharper and more efficient.

Dr. Daniel Willingham says that critical thinking has two benefits.

"One is that we learn to face new challenges and our brain becomes sharper. The other big benefit is that as we age, our brain's abilities often start weakening. But critical thinking helps keep the brain healthy and sharp in old age."

The question is, how does AI come in the way of critical thinking?

Dr. Michael Garlick is a professor of management at SBS Business School, Switzerland. We wanted to know from him how Artificial Intelligence or AI is defined.

He said, “There are two parts to this definition – artificial i.e. Artificial and intelligence means intelligence, which is operated by machines. It actually mimics the human brain in its work. Just like we train children, AI is also trained in the same way. He acquires the ability of humans to reason and understand. That means the machine takes decisions by analyzing the information available in it and helps us in many tasks. "She even makes decisions for us."

Artificial Intelligence collects many types of information or data and gives us answers by assessing the same. Earlier computers had limited information and all computers used to give the same answer to a question.

Artificial Intelligence is different in this matter and it can give different answers to the same question according to the context and situations based on different types of information. He keeps collecting new data which is also called Large Language Model.

Dr. Michael Garlick explains, “AI evaluates each word and guesses what you want to know, but it does not understand the context very well. The Large Language Model does not understand history. "It has a lot of information about history and it analyzes the words to understand what you want to know and responds accordingly."

“Generative Intelligence is now beginning to understand the complexities of information and questions. Now it is being used in our search engines, smartphones and platforms like WhatsApp. Based on language and data, it guesses what the correct answer to a question would be. Sometimes he even gets confused about it."

Generative AI sometimes gives us flattering answers. That means he wants to guess what you want to hear and presents answers accordingly.

Dr. Michael Garlick says that it was created to give us relief, so by the way we ask questions, it guesses whether we want to hear a positive or negative answer and responds accordingly. It helps us, but as our dependence on it increases, we start using our discretion and understanding less.

Dr. Michael Garlick believes that 'Generative AI saves our time and effort by doing many tasks faster, but at the same time it takes us away from thinking ourselves. In a way, he himself starts doing our thinking work. He starts taking decisions for us himself. I found in a study that as our dependence on AI increases, our critical thinking starts decreasing.

But can there be a way of using AI that helps us but does not reduce our critical thinking?

Yuvan So is the head and founder of a Singapore-based digital platform called Noodle Factory.

Actually, this platform based on AI is used in education and training. It was named Noodle Factory because its founder believed that using it was as easy as making noodles. But how does this platform help people in training?

Yuvan So said that this platform solves the problems that we all have been facing.

She says, “This is actually our clone. In many schools or colleges, if students do not understand something, they avoid asking questions again. But from this platform you can ask the answer to a question multiple times. Many international students have difficulty understanding the subject taught in a foreign language. This platform can teach students in their mother tongue."

Professor Sana's statement in graphics

Large language model is used to create this type of educational platform. All the data of a course is included in this platform which students can use as per their convenience.

Yuvan So says, “This platform works as an assistant to teachers, but artificial intelligence cannot replace teachers. His role is limited and he performs less important tasks performed by teachers. For example, he can answer frequently asked questions from students. "It can save teachers time by helping them with grading or checking papers."

There is no doubt that digital platforms based on Artificial Intelligence prove to be helpful in reading and writing. But does dependence on these make students' brains slow down?

Yuvan So said, “Many students use AI to complete the work given by teachers. For example, they write essays with the help of AI. But for this they have to enter a lot of data in the digital platform, about which they have to think. That means their own critical thinking is definitely used. We cannot ignore AI. But now teachers will have to adopt new methods of teaching and testing students keeping in mind the use of AI."

Not only DeepSeek, China is doing this high tech plan made 10 years ago. Image captionArtificial intelligence can also be used by advertising companies and they can encourage us to buy many things (symbolic image)

Sana Kharenghani, Professor of Practice in AI at King's College London, says that along with using AI, we should also use our brain.

Professor Sana Kharenghani says, "For example, we use our memory to solve a problem. But when using AI, we should think deeply about the answers we get from it and use or evaluate that information only after thinking."

"We have to adapt ourselves to use AI in the right way. We should also teach children to question the information received from AI instead of blindly trusting it so that this technology remains under our control. But government policies are also needed to control this technology."

AI can also be used by advertising companies and they can encourage us to buy many things. How can this be controlled?

Sana Kharenghani is of the opinion that the government should ensure that there is transparency in this technology.

She explains, "When AI explains something to us or encourages us to do something, we also need to know how confident the AI ​​is in its suggestion. For example, if the AI ​​​​is not completely confident in its suggestion, it should tell us that we should investigate other sources for this information. If it is about purchasing something, it should also tell us about other options."

But can AI reduce critical thinking?

Sana Kharenghani said, "We should reduce our dependence on AI. We should not think that AI will do all our work. It is important to maintain a balance between its use and the use of our brain. We should not distrust everything it says, because it will reduce our productivity. That is, we should use it in a balanced manner. But at the same time, it is important to control this technology to maintain transparency."

So now coming back to our main question – Is Artificial Intelligence destroying our ability to think?

Artificial Intelligence is rapidly becoming a part of our everyday life and we are gradually becoming dependent on it to perform many digital tasks.

Artificial Intelligence is increasing our productivity and is very helpful in teaching and learning. But as it is becoming more and more developed and our dependence on it is increasing, we have reduced the use of our brain to solve many problems, which can cause our brain to slow down.

We have also seen that we cannot always trust the answers of AI, so any conclusion should be taken only after thinking carefully about it.

AI will be able to eliminate our critical thinking only if we allow it to do so. Therefore, along with the use of AI, it is also important to use one's understanding and intelligence.