AI Is Quietly Making Us Worse at Thinking

An MIT study had people write essays with ChatGPT. Minutes later, more than 80 percent couldn't quote a single sentence from the essay they had just written. Their brains were measurably less engaged the whole time, and you could see it on the EEG. Here's what almost no one knows: this exact fear is 2,400 years old. Socrates said nearly the same thing about writing. We're living through the first moment in history where a tool can do our actual thinking for us, and most people are handing it over without noticing. I studied psychology and philosophy and spent six years in behavioral science research, three of them building VR products for mental fitness, so in this video I walk through what the research actually says, where it's still early, and what it means for you. By the end you'll know what's happening to the modern human brain, and the one kind of thinking you should never hand to AI. FREE 5-DAY SERIES From Confusion to Clarity: a simple 5-day process that walks you through finding your purpose, one question at a time. One rule: don't paste the questions into ChatGPT. That's the whole point. https://aubhrz.subscribepage.io/ CHAPTERS 0:00 Intro 1:15 The Oldest Fear: Socrates and Writing 3:30 Why AI Is Different: What the Research Says 6:45 Where the Human Mind Is in 2026 9:15 The One Thing You Can't Outsource 10:45 How to Use AI Without Losing Your Mind 13:45 Closing Book a coaching call with me: https://cal.com/abdulbaig/quick-chat Website: https://launchfromwithincoaching.com Email: mail@abdulbaig.com SOURCES Kosmyna et al. (2025), "Your Brain on ChatGPT," MIT Media Lab Gerlich (2025), Societies: AI tools, cognitive offloading and critical thinking Microsoft and Carnegie Mellon (2025), generative AI and critical thinking Budzyn et al. (2025), Lancet Gastroenterology and Hepatology: endoscopist deskilling Dahmani and Bohbot (2020), Scientific Reports: GPS use and spatial memory Gloria Mark, UC Irvine, on attention spans OpenAI: ChatGPT passes 900 million weekly users (Feb 2026) Plato, Phaedrus 274c to 275b (Jowett translation) Clark and Chalmers (1998), "The Extended Mind" Slamecka and Graf (1978), "The Generation Effect" Bjork (1994), "desirable difficulties" #AI #CriticalThinking #Philosophy #Socrates #PersonalGrowth