Implied Consent: Act II, Scene IV

(Enter MARK and VICTORIA into VICTORIA's residence. It is a house of ample size, with numerous works of classical art decorating the walls. There are two ornate chairs at the center of the stage.)

VICTORIA: Be seated, Edward, if I may call you that. Let us enjoy the true comfort of a sincere conversation among individuals, as we are at last free of that crowd of people who applaud a lot and understand not that, which they are applauding. I usually prefer to spend my time in a more refined manner.

MARK: How so?

VICTORIA: Unlike a certain person with whom you conversed to your own dismay, I know how to manage an inheritance well. I came upon it as the last survivor of the family line stretching from the elder brother of Quintus Grummond. Using it, I have created what no one else in the world possesses, not some passing fancy, mind you, but a permanent entity, whose contents and benefits to me are cumulative.

MARK (curious): What is it?

VICTORIA: Whence did that melody originate when we first met? How was it made audible without an instrument or a pianist, or even a stationary device that could play a recording? Do you truly think that the music started to play as a mere coincidence? No, Edward, it was a test of sorts that I had performed on you, to see if you were worthy of my company, to observe if you had the ability to appreciate the greatest heights to which man, through his rational creation, can aspire. I saw your approach, and was interested as to what would motivate you to seek me out. I do not grant my acquaintance to others easily, you know.

How was I able to broadcast that melody, then? Through this. (She extracts a small black cube from her pocket.) This is my Virtual Reality Museum of High Art, the product of an investment comprising the majority of my inheritance. In it are contained the most precisely rendered digital versions of the paintings, sculptures, and musical works that represent the profoundest virtues of man. I could press a button on this cube, and project a hologram of a Vermeer, or play a Beethoven symphony in all its grandeur and intricacy. I could press another button, and unfold the entire museum before our eyes.

(She presses the button. Perhaps it could be possible for several additional melodies to be composed for this purpose, to be played while MARK and VICTORIA engage in their conversation. In the meantime, it could be also be arranged to suspend a screen in the air and project onto it an image of a gallery with paintings lining the walls and sculptures arranged in a row, dividing the gallery's walkway in two.)

VICTORIA: Though the scene you now see before you is not comprised of matter, there is perhaps more substance to it than to the lives of those who would ignore contemplation of such subjects. We could spend days wandering through this expanse I had created for my inspiration, but we ought to begin at the root of all things, including this gallery.

MARK: The root of art?

VICTORIA: And of every characteristic that distinguishes man from the animals and from inanimate matter. You wished to investigate the matter of the Estate of Grummond, and, recall, that, to accurately study that situation, you must first find out what it is that defines our humanity. Hint: it is not our capacity to feel, as Mr. Roberts would have you believe.

MARK: I suspected that much.

VICTORIA: Yes, and you had good reason to. Would your business have ever developed to the extent of securing your lifelong prosperity if you had just felt your way through its management? Or would it have never been a business in the first place, but rather some haphazard, cloudy, only half-identified urge to start something the methodology of which you would not be aware of, since knowledge of method requires something other than feelings, the objectives of which would escape you, since feelings cannot in themselves delineate a clear purpose for you? No, to derive your purpose, you had to look at something far more fundamental, namely, reality.

MARK: Reality, it seems, is such a simple term, yet so many people, in their uses of it, disagree on precisely what it refers to.

VICTORIA: That is why philosophy is so important. It enables us to rid ourselves of mistaken and inconsistent uses of the most fundamental and thus the most significant concepts we can have, and thus allows to apply them as they can best serve us. What is reality, Edward, but that which is, in the broadest sense? Most of the conventional uses of "reality" presuppose that it is something far narrower. We are told, for example, that only the norms and mundane routines of the common denominator in our society constitute "the real world," whereas anything else is fantasy. They are reality, too, but so are the ambitions of the creator, the businessman, the uncommon individual, who, through his skill and will, rearranges the elements of reality to form something greater than had existed before him. So long as we live, reality cannot be escaped, run away from it though one might try. The fact that things exist and have a specific nature to them is inherent to our every proposition and statement, along with the fact that we possess the conscious mind to grasp what things exist and what they are. Is that not what a businessman does, use his mind to grasp what is, and use his mind to see how it can best be worked with, perpetuated, altered, or counteracted to his advantage?

MARK: I cannot see any other way to do business.

VICTORIA: I cannot see any other way to live. We humans, like all that exists, too have a specific nature. Our nature requires us to use our reason, that capacity which identifies reality, for our very survival. Only by actively engaging reality with our faculties can we ever understand or accomplish anything. Our emotions can sometimes be valid indicators of reality, but never just because they exist. Emotions, too, must have a consciously identified basis in reality for them, and must be arrived at through reason; otherwise they are sheer wanton whims.

MARK: Whims such as the whims of Oswald, who seeks his father's fortune so that he may engage in unsubstantiated destruction.

VICTORIA: Oswald is not the type of individual who would be able to survive on his own. He indulges his whims too much, rather than restructuring his mind so that these whims are neither present nor desired. But then again I try not to care about Oswald; his defiance of reality and reason has already marked him for the ultimate failure, and there is nothing that neither I nor you nor a giant inheritance can do to prevent it. Only Oswald can prevent it, and he will not. Which brings me to another point: will. Men are by nature beings of reason, which means they are beings of volition. To choose to reason, man must be able to choose. At every instant in his life, his mind can go down one of a multitude of paths, whose consequences it is the task of his mind to ultimately analyze and decide to accept or reject. Ultimately, a man's standing in life is determined solely by his will. Even if external obstacles to his advancement exist, it will depend on his will whether he shall be able to overcome them. Now, this is most important: because no one can know reality in place of the individual, and no one can choose in place of the individual, nobody should try to impose his own way on another. Others may suggest to the individual, persuade him, offer conditions to their association with him, trade with him, or even ridicule him, but they can never legitimately force him. Each individual has a universal natural right to be free of this coercion.

MARK: Hmmm... every individual, then, is by this right legitimately free from coercion by anyone, including the government, the community, and even his closest relatives?

VICTORIA: Especially from them, unless that individual has committed a violation of somebody else's natural rights, in which case he should receive a punishment corresponding to the offense. But other than that, the prohibition against coercion is universal.

MARK: But what about children, who must depend on their parents to survive, and yet know not fully what reality is, how to approach it, and what goals to pursue?

VICTORIA: Even there, parents may only guide and instruct the child in what to do, and place conditions on the use of their, the parents' property, which the child is surrounded by. However, they may not arbitrarily beat the child, or impose unlivable conditions and contradictory demands on him, and may punish him only for legitimate offenses and in such ways as will not deprive the child of the full ability to develop and use his reason. They, too, cannot be said to have the ultimate authority over the child's mind, and the entirety of their power consists of ensuring that the child may be gradually freed from their power.

MARK: But, then, what about people who can never become freed from such care-taking, people who are paralyzed in certain critical faculties?

VICTORIA: So long as they are still alive, they still possess the capacity to exercise their will in at least some part of their lives. So long as they can do so, they should be allowed to do so, and no one may overrule them in these areas. In all other areas necessary for survival, but in which those individuals are physically unable to act, their guardians can only perform those actions which are unquestionably beneficial to those individuals' lives. They may feed a man whose paralysis prevents him from feeding himself, but they may not give him poison in place of food, or starve him while he is under their care. He who undertakes the role of guardian is never legitimately a master or a ruler, but rather one who consents, of his own will, to help an individual, and only to help him, where help is needed.

MARK: So, thus, you would agree that nobody has the authority to kill a dependent in his care, even if the dependent's paralysis is pervasive?

VICTORIA: Nobody has the authority to kill an innocent individual, period. The death penalty can apply to the vilest of criminals only, who have violated others' rights to life through horrid acts of murder. An individual's life is the ultimate purpose of all of that individuals' values, for without living, he would not be able to value in the first place. Thus, to deprive a living individual of his ultimate value is the most heinous act of all.

MARK (excited): Then it is clear beyond all doubt! Oswald and Trent Roberts would be committing the act of murder if they were to succeed in their lawsuit! They would terminate the life of a good, innocent man!

VICTORIA: Except, the question remains as to whether Quintus Grummond is alive at this time.

MARK: What do you define as being alive?

VICTORIA: Mr. Roberts might have in fact gotten a part of the definition right in his speech; life requires some central mechanism, such as a brain, for coordinating its functions. Since my uncle does not have current use of his brain, the state of his life is quite ambivalent at this point. To be honest, I am not yet entirely certain whether he is alive or dead.

MARK: But do we always need to have the present use of our brains to be considered alive? After all, when we enter deep sleep, we also cannot use our minds, but we are nearly guaranteed to use them in the future, when we wake. Is a sleeping man not alive beyond any doubt?

VICTORIA: You are fast learning to reason like a philosopher. It seems that you are correct here: if there is a future guarantee or even a likelihood that a given person will be able to operate by at least some volitional use of his mind, we cannot have the authority to irreversibly damage or destroy that person. But, for somebody who is comatose or brain dead, how can we have such a guarantee?

MARK: I might know of such-(cuts himself off after realizing that he was on the verge of revealing information that Dr. Waltonford had requested him to keep secret).

VICTORIA: Yes?

MARK: Of such... cases... where individuals have been shown to recover from comas and regain uses of their minds.

VICTORIA: Rare cases, though.

MARK: But rare enough to claim comatose individuals as dead beyond all doubt? How low a probability of recovery is needed to terminate somebody's last chance for living again? And is probability even a legitimate criterion on which to make such a philosophical judgment? If the conclusions of philosophy are supposed to have a universal logic to them, would not drawing the line at some probability or another be arbitrary and internally inconsistent?

VICTORIA: You ask an interesting question: if we are lacking certainty of a given outcome, as we often are, in what manner are we justified in acting? And is this manner of acting applicable to all such similar occasions where we are likewise not certain? I shall have to ponder this over. I would like to find an answer, as always, but I do not have one presently. You, too, ought to search for a consistent solution, for I can only take you so far.

MARK: Perhaps, we are in need of additional information. I do not yet know exactly how the Estate of Grummond plans to defend itself, and what arguments Mr. Neville shall use in court to advance the maintenance of Mr. Grummond and his will. Mr. Neville is an efficient worker, for what I know of him, and, by this time, he must have thought of something.

VICTORIA: But do not go to him yet. We can explore the halls of my collection for hours on end, while I explain to you how art can serve as man's guide to reason and reality, and his inspiration to act in rational ways. And, by the way, you must promise me that you will return here again, and frequently. I have much to teach you, and I do enjoy your company immensely.

MARK: I shall, with pleasure. What you offer me may well be the foundation of my new life.

VICTORIA: Or of your old life, to other things extended. Be rational in all things, and you will be a true Renaissance man, successful at every one of them. Come, Edward.

(They walk to the end of the stage, while the image on the screen can also be made to move accordingly. The lights dim until an absolute darkness between this scene and the next, to indicate the passage of several hours of time in between.)

To read other parts of Implied Consent, go here.