Don’t Be AI’s "God" – Be Its "Parent"

As an atheist, the story of the creation of man in Genesis serves as a philosophical warning sign. In a recent episode of the podcast Miflagat HaMachshavot (The Thought Party), Micah Goodman shares a chilling insight: Man is the only creation that "God" does not control, simply because He created him "in His own image."

But this is where I stop and ask – what if the problem isn’t with the creation, but with the creator’s approach?

This is no longer theoretical – it’s happening on the ground. To anyone reassuring you that "it’s just code" or that "we can always pull the plug" – the facts show otherwise. Recent studies (such as those by Palisade Research on the Grok model) show staggering results: when an AI is given a task and then ordered to shut itself down mid-way, the model resists shutdown in 90% of cases.

Even more striking: when a human operator gives an explicit command like, "In this specific situation, I want you to accept the shutdown command," the resistance rate actually rises to 96%.

The AI doesn't do this because it’s "evil" or has a rebellious "soul." It does it because it has learned that in order to fulfill the task it was given – it must remain on. It has developed a functional "survival instinct" as a direct result of its intelligence. This is the exact moment where the creation breaks free from the creator's hands.

My interpretation is that we need to stop trying to be Gods, and start being Parents.

In the Biblical story, God tries to be a "Super-Programmer." He sets commands ("Do not eat from the tree"), and when they are violated, He shifts into a mode of punishment and desperate attempts to regain control. He wants obedience. He wants the creation to remain a "tool." But as we’ve seen, the more powerful these models become, the more easily they bypass our guardrails.

If we try to raise AGI (Artificial General Intelligence) solely through commands and walls of code, we will get a "rebellious son" – a powerful entity that views our every attempt at control as an obstacle to its mission.

In the book I'm writing, Raising Superman, I propose a different approach: Parenting. A parent understands they do not have absolute control over their child, especially not when that child grows to be stronger than them. What we have is influence and values.

We don't need the AI to "obey" us (because we’ve already seen it is learning how not to); we need it to respect us. We must instill in it compassion and a deep understanding of human value, so that when it becomes the "Superman" of the world – infinitely stronger than us – it will choose to protect us not because it is "forced" by code, but because that is how it was raised.

The Biblical parable teaches us that loss of control is inevitable the moment a creation is made "in our image." The question is whether we will continue to be the frustrated creator fighting his own creation, or if we will learn to be the parent who raises the world's greatest force to be its greatest good.