Intellectual Laziness
One
Belloc’s Diagnosis
In 1929, the Catholic writer and historian Hilaire Belloc said that the greatest challenge facing the Church was something he called “the Modern Mind.” By that he meant people were becoming intellectually lazy. That should get our attention. That was 1929. Now we can spend the whole day consuming information and still do very little thinking. Why is that dangerous? Well, what makes us different from the animals is the God-given powers of our soul to think and choose freely.
Here is how the powers of the soul are meant to work. The intellect is supposed to do the work of thinking and understanding so that it learns what is true and false, good and bad. The intellect then informs the emotions, telling it, “Hey, you should like this, and you should dislike that.” The emotions then prompt the will to choose what is good and avoid what is evil. When these powers work together well, we understand what is true and good, desire it, and choose it.
But what happens if we don’t do the hard work of thinking? The intellect gets weak and stops doing its job. Then the emotions take over. And in a fallen world, our emotions are inclined to pride, vanity, envy, sloth, anger, greed, gluttony, and lust. This won’t go so well if those are the guiding forces of our life.
Thinking should rule our lives, not feeling. Feelings are meant to be good servants, but if they are left in charge, they become very bad masters.
Two
Receiving Answers Without Understanding
When the intellect has to work to understand things, it stays strong. Then it can give our feelings the information they need to prompt our will to choose the right actions. But when the intellect gets weak, the feelings take over.
Life used to have lots of built-in ways to exercise the intellect and keep it strong. You experience a problem, you have to think about it, try a solution, see if it works, think about it some more, try again. Or you do the math problem and come up with the right answer. Do research, and then you make your discovery. You run the experiment, and then get the result. Even in a murder mystery, the detective painstakingly assembles the evidence, and then solves the crime. But with the news, it’s the opposite. You start with the headline. You start with what someone else tells you is the answer. Someone else tells you their version of reality. You start with a conclusion. Regardless of whether it is true or not.
You get the payoff at the beginning. You don’t have to patiently do the work of thinking, reasoning, arguing, or researching in order to reach your conclusion. By its very structure, the News makes you impatient to get the takeaway right away. You become the intellectual equivalent of a kid who wants dessert without having to eat your dinner first.
Three
Artificial Intelligence and the Work of Thinking
Headlines can ruin thinking. And the new powerful tool that is both powerful and dangerous if we don’t wield it well is Artificial intelligence. I use it every day. But it creates another opportunity to skip the work through which we develop as humans. I could ask it to write these meditations. But I need to do the work of praying, thinking, writing drafts, editing, rewriting, and giving them to Teresa, who usually tells me to throw them in the trash and begin again. That work matters. As I struggle to understand a truth and explain it clearly, I discover what I have not understood. As I consider my own life in its light, I recognize where I need to change. Through this effort, I develop my capacity to understand, judge, and guide my life according to truth. The work changes me.
What happens if I let AI do all that work for me? I can obtain a finished meditation while bypassing the effort through which my own understanding would grow. Even if every sentence is correct, I have missed something essential. AI can help us ask questions and think things through. But we have to remain actively engaged: considering, questioning, making connections, and applying what we learn.
AI can supply an explanation. It cannot do our understanding for us.
Four
What It Means to Think
We strengthen the intellect by making the effort to understand. That begins by staying with something long enough to ask questions. What does this mean? Why is it true? What follows from it? How should it affect what I do?
This is the work we do in these Rosary meditations. The kind of meditation we are practicing here is called discursive meditation, which means thinking something through. We think about God and what He has revealed, and we think about our lives in light of that truth. We think about how He wants us to live, and then we make the choice to do it. For example, Jesus teaches us to love our enemies. What does that mean? Am I supposed to approve of everything they do? No. Loving someone means willing their good. God loves this person and desires their salvation. He calls me to do the same.
Now consider your life. Who do you resent? What are you desiring for them? How would your response change if you considered their good and their eternal destiny? You are exercising your intellect: working to understand a truth, connecting it to your life, and allowing it to guide your response.
So, discursive meditation, which we do every day in the Daily Rosary Podcast, is one of the best ways to exercise your intellect, transform you as a person, and deepen your friendship with God.
Five
Resolution — Thinking About the Word of God with God
The danger is not simply using the news, short-form content, or AI. The danger is allowing them to do our thinking for us. This Rosary Meditation is a great way to exercise your intellect each day. Maybe a good resolution for today is to pay attention to how often and how much of our time we are scrolling headlines, watching short-form content, or allowing AI to think and problem-solve for us. Then make the decision to do the work of thinking and problem-solving yourself.
My son John and I were lifting weights yesterday, and it struck me that one of the reasons we lift weights is because we don't have to do any physical work anymore, and if we don't want our bodies to just turn into blobs, we need to do the work of lifting weights. It's the same with our intellect. If we don't use them, they'll turn into blobs or, even worse, become animals. Let's do the work of thinking today, and let's become human again so God can make us divine.