Let’s Talk About AI
DR SHAADY HARRISON | 3 minutes
At first, it was easy to miss.
In 2000, scientists decided to study the brains of black cab drivers. Nothing obvious stood out on the MRI scans, and then a pattern began to emerge.
Years of navigating the streets of London had physically changed the brains of its taxi drivers.
Quite literally rising to the occasion, the hippocampus – the area responsible for memory and navigation – had visibly grown from years of learning every street and shortcut.
But buried in the data was something else too.
The drivers who retired showed the reverse. The same region, built over a lifetime of navigation, had begun to shrink. Not from injury or age, but from simply not being used anymore.
Like language and memory, strength and stamina, the human brain follows a simple rule.
Use it or lose it.
This Isn’t New
Humans have always outsourced things.
Calculators freed from us from mental maths, clocks took over time, GPS replaced navigation.
Progress has always been a trade.
But previous tools outsourced specific skills. For the first time in human history, we’re now outsourcing thinking.
Use it or Lose it
A large part of deep thinking is invisible.
It involves sitting with half-baked ideas, turning things over, and tolerating that messy middle phase until something clicks. This applies whether we’re solving a problem at work, making a big decision, or trying to fix a relationship.
Our brains rely on thinking as the foundation for everything we do.
But we’re now living in a world where the hard part can be skipped.
This is great if we’re looking for answers, it’s not so great if we’re trying to figure out our own.
Our brains physically change depending on what we do with them.
If we consistently skip the messy middle, we move from being originators of thought to editors of it.
The uncomfortable part of thinking isn’t a bug in the system - it’s the whole point.
How To Win
AI is not inherently a problem.
Used properly, it’s one of the most brilliant cognitive tools we’ve ever had.
It acts as a thinking partner, helps explore ideas faster, and frees up bandwidth for higher-level decisions.
But ten years from now we still want to be able to think without it.
Big decisions, relationships, tricky conversations with children; all of the high stakes moments in life rely on our ability to think clearly in real time.
The uncomfortable middle ground of thinking – where insights are fuzzy and effort is required – is increasingly becoming optional.
Protecting your brain in an AI-heavy world isn’t about avoiding it. Small constraints, used well, go far in keeping thinking sharp in the long run.
This might look like writing a messy first draft beforehand, or using it to stretch an idea rather than generate the first version. Deliberately keeping some tasks AI-free makes it easier to think independently when it counts.
The human brain keeps what it uses, and slowly lets go of what it doesn’t.
Used well, artificial intelligence doesn’t replace thinking, it raises the bar. But as our world revels in the power of AI, the lasting advantage will belong to those who know when to use it, and when to close the tab.
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Navigation-related structural change in the hippocampi of taxi drivers. Maguire, E. A., Gadian, D. G., Johnsrude, I. S., Good, C. D., Ashburner, J., Frackowiak, R. S., & Frith, C. D. (2000). Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 97(8), 4398-4403.
Google effects on memory: Cognitive consequences of having information at our fingertips. Sparrow, B., Liu, J., & Wegner, D. M. (2011). Science, 333(6043), 776-778.
The extended mind. Clark, A., & Chalmers, D. (1998). Analysis, 58(1), 7-19.
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About The Author
Shaady Harrison is a British medical doctor, writer and private advisor specialising in the intersection of psychology, calm and performance.