I was literally just ranting last week about how AI agents, if we let them run the show, are going to bulldoze our sense of agency.

And now, surprise surprise, Microsoft — yes, the same Microsoft that loves slapping “Copilot” on every piece of software like it’s seasoning — has put out a paper confirming what many of us already felt in our gut: the more we rely on generative AI, the less actual thinking we’re doing.

Let me break it down. The study basically found that people fall into two camps when it comes to AI:

1. Those who use it and then still have the brainpower and confidence to critique the results, edit, rethink, and steer it.
2. And those who just… don’t. Whether from lack of experience, skill, or just straight-up mental muscle wastage, they start relying so hard on AI that they no longer trust their own judgment. It’s “whatever the AI says, boss.”

None of this is brand new, of course. We already know the user base is split into “never touch it”, “dabble here and there”, and “married to ChatGPT”. But what the study does reveal is something quietly disturbing — the way AI is reshaping what we even define as critical thinking.

Apparently, we’re no longer critically thinking in the way humans used to — like building original thoughts from scratch.

Instead, we’re critically thinking after the fact: reading AI-generated sludge and trying to figure out if it’s passable, editable, or complete trash.

In other words, we’re not starting from our own brains anymore. We’re just becoming AI editors. Or worse — proofreaders of content we didn’t even author. And yeah, productivity might be going up in some places, but at what cost?

Here’s the part that worries me: this erosion of thinking won’t be obvious in people like me or you — the generation that remembers life before smartphones were glued to our palms.

I grew up without Google in my pocket. I remember dial-up, playing outside, writing actual essays with a pen. So when I use AI today, it’s a choice. I’ve still got a baseline to compare it to. I still know how to think without it.

But imagine being born into this tech. Like, really born into it. Kids today are spoon-fed screens from day dot. They’re not coming into this world with a silver spoon — they’re coming in with a giant LED rectangle shoved in their faces. And it shows.

Same goes for AI. Right now, we’re in this bizarre honeymoon phase — early adoption, fast learning, breathless optimism. But for the next gen, AI won’t be a tool they chose to integrate. It’ll be part of the air they breathe.

Eric Hoel nails it. He says he’s not worried about adults using AI to enhance work. What scares him is the 12-year-old doing their homework through AI, and then coming back to the same bot with every follow-up question — even the dumb ones they should absolutely be mulling over themselves.

We already have “iPad kids.” Are we seriously ready for a wave of “meat puppet teens”?

Because that’s where we’re headed. Generation Meat Puppet. Sounds like a Netflix dystopia, but it’s not even science fiction anymore.

And in the short term? Let’s be honest — this is exactly what Big Business wants. The holy grail for them is a world where critical thinking isn’t just optional, it’s extinct.

Fewer thinkers mean fewer resisters. The plan? Replace knowledge workers with AI, then replace the AI babysitters with low-wage hires, all while patting themselves on the back with profit reports.

But longer term? We’re looking at a potential brain drain so big it makes the climate crisis look manageable. Critical thinking could become a rare skill — something premium, expensive, sought after. Like a vintage typewriter or a clean glass of water in a dystopia.

If you can string together a coherent opinion without asking a bot first? You win.

Which is why the news about Anthropic made me snort. Apparently, when people applied for jobs there, the company explicitly said: don’t use AI to help you apply. They wanted to see your raw, unprocessed, human-written thoughts.

The irony? Chef’s kiss.

An AI company that doesn’t want people using AI to talk to them — because it makes applicants sound like boring sludge bots. They’re admitting it outright: if you overuse AI, your brain starts to rot. And they don’t want that in their workplace.

So yeah, maybe the future generation will have access to the most powerful tools humanity’s ever built… and still be too mentally soft to know what to do with it.

Because you can give someone an AI-powered spaceship — but if they never learned how to read the stars? They’re just sitting in the cockpit, asking the bot how to fly, and hoping it doesn’t crash.