Nowadays, the use of artificial intelligence is part of human life. The time once spent in the library for research and investigation has been replaced by a few questions entered into a search bar. Just as fire made life easier for ancient people, AI provides quick solutions to problems that could take days or even weeks to solve manually. However, every gift carries a risk. While artificial intelligence makes education more convenient, it also deprives students of the opportunity to develop critical thinking skills, such as asking questions, analyzing problems, and solving them independently. Someone may attempt to do their homework, but the system will complete it automatically. As a result, they do not spend enough time thinking about what they have achieved. Instead of trying to find answers on their own, they readily accept the information available to them. Therefore, the main issue is not whether AI is useful or harmful, but whether a person uses their own brain or relies on AI to complete the task.

The outcome persists, but the act dissolves; and in that same void left behind by the act, the human mind, once substantial and vibrant, becomes nothing more than a sheet of clear plastic- a thin, fragile, and somewhat repulsive blemish.

But the real issue is that while AI provides information, it is also transforming how people form their opinions. Individuals prefer quick summaries over deep knowledge and seek instant gratification rather than taking time for thoughtful reflection. While convenience is a valuable trait, using it as the primary standard for thought often overshadows the importance of reflection and truth. Thought turns into labor; investigation turns into an endless chore of delay; even judgment, the last frontier of human freedom, is tranquilly outsourced- to the submission of one‘s soul to the immaculateness and abhorrence of a machine, to the envelopment of one’s pure thought in some pristine yet abhorrent matter, in some translucent shell in which the rot of contemplation can quietly fester.

In the end, humanity transforms into something different- no longer a realm of thinkers, but one that feeds on the decayed remnants of thought. Artificial intelligence can certainly guide us toward a more convenient life. However, whether such convenience benefits us depends not on the technology itself, but on how we choose to use it. With the same tool, some will use it to expand their minds, while others will let machines think for them. If all our decisions are left entirely to AI without human reflection, our ability to analyze information and judge situations will inevitably diminish.

And there we stand: are we to be creatures capable of making wiser choices through such technology, or will we be lost in the numbing comfort of simplicity, absolved even from the responsibility of making choices? The era of AI has already begun, but its destination is still unwritten- and perhaps what is most frightening, but also most magnificent, is that we ourselves still hold such power.

<Uyun Choi 학생기자 요바린다 고교 10학년>