This resonates! I know that you came with similar conclusion in "Rewarding thinking", but I still have a reaction to the first sentence :)

Is the ideal UI really the one that doesn't make us think? What if we push that idea into it's maximum - if you interact with any interface there's exactly zero thinking involved. But doesn't that kill creativity? Doesn't that kill gradual learning? Doesn't that kill exercising our brains?

I think it might - and so while "making UI that doesn't make users think" is a good rule of thumb, it's one of those where too much is too much.

The adjustment that I would suggest is to think through what is the core responsibility of the given app/UI, to think through what is the main goal that the users are trying to achieve while using the interface. I believe that everything that's not related to this core responsibility/goal should be eliminated, automated, optimized away (in this order) as much possible, but for the core responsibility - give the user some degrees of freedom, let them be creative, let them surprise you, outsource your "visioning" to your user.

And so maybe the first sentence could be adjusted as "The ideal UI is the one that doesn't make us think about things unrelated to what we are trying to achieve."

In this context it may be also worth remembering #42818 (When to design for Emergence).