Predavatelji / Instructors: Professor Dimitar Trajanov, Ph.D.
Two centuries of mechanization have made us wealthier, safer, and more productive, but also less physically active and, in some respects, physically weaker. Studies suggest that adult grip strength has declined by approximately 20% since the mid-1980s, occupational energy expenditure has fallen by around 140 calories per day since the 1960s, and physical inactivity contributes to millions of premature deaths annually. This transformation was not simply a failure of individual discipline. Machines replaced physical effort, societies reorganized around that convenience, and activities that once maintained our physical capabilities gradually disappeared from everyday life. Are we now witnessing a similar transformation of the human mind?
Generative AI and increasingly autonomous agents are beginning to replace not only routine cognitive tasks but also activities central to learning, reasoning, creativity, and decision-making. Unlike physical mechanization, this transition is unfolding at unprecedented speed, potentially affecting nearly every domain of intellectual activity.
This talk introduces the Cognitive Obesity Hypothesis and examines five emerging warning signs: reduced cognitive engagement during AI-assisted writing, the relationship between cognitive offloading and diminished critical thinking, AI dependence and weaker independent reasoning among students, the potential deskilling of knowledge workers as AI assistants evolve into autonomous agents, and the gradual disappearance of the desirable difficulties essential to deep learning and long-term knowledge retention. These findings are preliminary and do not establish inevitable cognitive decline. The talk will also explore the counterargument that AI can enhance human intelligence by expanding our capabilities rather than replacing them.
The second half turns from diagnosis to prevention. What can we learn from the successes and failures of efforts to combat physical inactivity? I will argue that maintaining cognitive fitness requires more than limiting AI use. It calls for deliberately preserving intellectually demanding activities, developing reliable measures of independent cognitive performance, establishing institutional practices that protect human capabilities, and cultivating a new culture of mental training. This includes cognitive physical education, deliberate AI-free practice, and personal cognitive fitness indicators that make our independent abilities as visible and measurable as physical performance.
Professor Dimitar Trajanov, Ph.D., is a visiting research professor at Boston University and a full professor at the Faculty of Computer Science and Engineering. Cyril and Methodius University –Skopje. In 2025, he was elected as an Associate Member of the Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts. In addition to his academic roles, he serves as an AI consultant for leading international and national companies, providing expertise in cutting-edge AI technologies.
From March 2011 until September 2015, he was the founding dean of the Faculty of Computer Science and Engineering. During his tenure, he successfully established and expanded the faculty, transforming it into the largest and most prestigious technical faculty in Macedonia. From 2024 to 2025, Dimitar was a member of the National Higher Education Accreditation Board, and from 2026, a member of the National Council for Higher Education and Scientific Research. From 2015 to 2022, he was Head of the Department of Information Systems and Network Technologies. Dimitar Trajanov is the leader of the Regional Social Innovation Hub, which was established in 2013 as a cooperation between the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Faculty of Computer Science and Engineering.
He has authored over 200 journal and conference papers and seven books and has been actively involved in more than 70 research and industry projects, serving as the project leader for over 40 of them. His research interests span Artificial Intelligence (AI), Data Science, Machine Learning, Natural Language Processing (NLP), Semantic Web, FinTech, AI Applications in Health and Pharmacology, Technology for Development, and Climate Change. He is currently the Project Leader of VEZILKA, a Horizon Europe project to establish an AI Factory Antenna in North Macedonia.
In recognition of his outstanding research contributions, he received the prestigious Best Scientist Award for the year 2023 at Ss. Cyril and Methodius University is in the field of technical and engineering sciences