A new MIT study has examined whether constant use of ChatGPT and similar tools quietly reduces brain function, with early findings suggesting the tool may make thinking weaker over time. Dr Daniel Amen, a brain health physician who has scanned the brains of Justin Bieber, Miley Cyrus, and Kendall Jenner, and Dr Terry Sejnowski, a computational neuroscience pioneer who helped build the Boltzmann machine, have publicly discussed this question. The article notes that brain reserve—the cognitive cushion built over a lifetime of learning, struggle, and mental exercise—is increasingly discussed as one of the strongest protections against future cognitive decline. The piece argues that ChatGPT may train the human brain to avoid discomfort, offering instant answers where slow struggle once built value, and cites examples including a student asking ChatGPT to write an essay, a lonely man confiding in an AI girlfriend, and a grandmother in Accra forgetting a road she has walked for thirty years.