EDIT Ok so it's just the trolly problem.
EDIT2 : AHA War Games 1983. "The only winning move is not to play." (We might call this the final product of a lot of smart philosophical digestion, because it's a famous movie). There's always the perfectly valid option to ditch the riddle. (Because maybe the riddle is dumb, or maybe the riddle is no better than a thousand others, utilitywise )
There were 2 forks in the road at the end there.
Fork 1) The people running the institute were being totally evil. But it was to save the world. Oh what a moral conundrum!
King's choice : oh wait no, they were actually wrong about that. They were just being dumb. As explained by the genius. So all the bad stuff they did was for nothing good and the institute was just evil.
Fork 2) The psychic kids mindmelded into a magic hivemind deity. Wow. This is certainly something amazing and new in the world .
King's choice. : oh wait no, that whole thing immediately faded away after the climax.
Why? Maybe he was hoping for a tv series, which requires no big changes and moral simplicity
Is it the beliefs? The dogmatism? The epistemology? Something else?
It goes like this : Focus intensely upon your work. Make it awesome. And let everything else go to hell.
I mean samatha/vipassana or whatever.
I encounter things relevant to atheism sometimes when I meditate.
I know meditation isn't necessarily a christian thing. Maybe prayer.
I figure, buddist or christian, we're all studying the same reality. Whatever we call it or however we describe it. And in our process of investigation we will all do that same self-cultivating and deeper seeing.
I do shikantaza (zen meditation).
It's part of my mind, or body, or thereabouts.
It's why dreams (and supposedly the afterlife) invariably involve time, space, people etc.
Raw reality is made of vibes or poetry. A song without words. Then the translator adds the words.
EX : The protagonist in a story. The player's avatar in a game. An action figure. A shambling edifice of meat...
