Where and How AI Shapes our Thinking is the Key Point

This paper examines how the progressive integration of AI into epistemic practices is reshaping human knowledge production and our broader interface with reality. Building on Bianchini (2025a) and engaging with Branda (2026), it argues that AI can no longer be regarded as an epistemically neutral tool, but actively influences human cognition in supportive, indifferent, or detrimental ways. The widespread adoption of Large Language Models across digital environments introduces risks of conceptual homogenization and threatens epistemic diversity and creative originality. Drawing on the System 0 framework proposed by Chiriatti et al. (2024) and its extension in Branda’s concept of the Thinkframe, the paper explores how AI participates in cognitive processes both at the individual and collective levels. While these frameworks illuminate important dynamics of human-AI co-creation, they require further theoretical refinement, particularly regarding the specific role of AI within distributed cognitive systems and its implications for epistemic autonomy and authority.