Are We Outsourcing Our Thinking? Reflections on AI and Cognition

Sat, 31 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Lately I’ve been following a discussion that worries me quite a bit: to what extent are we delegating our thinking to AI. It’s not an abstract or philosophical question, it’s something very real I’m seeing day to day in our profession and in society in general.

Recently I read an article by Erik Johannes Husom titled “Outsourcing thinking” that, among other things, discusses the concept of “lump of cognition fallacy”. The idea is that, just as there’s an economic fallacy saying there’s a fixed amount of work to do, some believe there’s a fixed amount of thinking to do, and if machines think for us, we’ll just think about other things.

Critical-Thinking on Antonio Cortés (DrZippie)

Are We Outsourcing Our Thinking? Reflections on AI and Cognition