fandomhigh | Practical Crisis Problem Solving - Danger Shop, Tuesday, Period 3 (11am-12pm)

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Practical Crisis Problem Solving - Danger Shop, Tuesday, Period 3 (11am-12pm)

The Doctor's TAs were noticeably absent and that bothered him. That was only one reason why he looked irritable as he paced the room that looked like your average generic high-tech control room. The other reason, well, one of the other reasons was the topic at hand.

"Compassion. If you don't know what it is, look in the Wikipedia and don't bother me today. If you do know what it is, then you'll understand what we're doing today. Any species can develop enough technologically to be considered advanced. It's the social development, the interconnectedness with the rest of the universe and how one holds oneself in standing with the rest of existence that truly determines how advanced a species is.

Having compassion and exercising compassion differ. One is a feeling, a built-in empathy, an emotional response. The other is a choice, a moral dilemma that many of you will have to face at some point. Exercising compassion isn't easy. It shouldn't always be. It's the choices you make when it isn't easy that make compassion as important as it is."

The Doctor gestured around him. "All hypothetical here, but the emotion is real. We're in a control room under Fandom Island." It wasn't a recreation of the actual control room; this was just something that looked fancy and high-tech enough to do the job. "This is what makes it tick. It's what keeps the island as an access point to the many, many different universes and time periods. You'd need an incredible amount of power to keep that going as long as it has. Ever wonder what does it?" He pointed to a pulse beam that kept shooting electricity into what looked like a large, exposed brain.

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However you feel right now

Prince Alexander of Daventry

Jason Todd

Didi

Shane Gooseman

Makita

Peter Bishop

Rosalind

Karla

Parker

Clark Kent

Helen Haras-Uquara

Alex Russo

Diana Hansen

James of Krondor

Dru Anderson

Ben Skywalker

Jenny Sparks

If that's your sort of thing.

"This is a star whale, one of an ancient, kind, magnificent, wonderful and peaceful species and this is the last of its kind." He used his sonic screwdriver to amplify the agonised scream of the star whale for five seconds, and then turned it off. "For years, centuries even, it's been tortured all day, every day, to power the island, to make it possible for all of you to be here, for this place to exist. If you free the star whale, there's a very good chance you'll all never see home again and no one will ever be able to come here again. The island will be cut off, cast off into the nothing between universes where it belongs. No guarantee, but a good chance. Or you could ensure the continued existence of this place, this marvellous, impossible place, by continuing to torture an innocent and benevolent and sentient creature. Or is there another way?" He looked around at all of them. "Is there?"

"How does the whale feel about it?" Didi asked, then seemed to understand it sounded like a dumb question. "Nothing likes being tortured. Almost nothing. But if the whale's sentient, if it understand how much good it's doing, it might see its individual sacrifice as being worth the pain. That's how soldiers think, right?"

"Not just soldiers."

Alexander had resolved to, for the most part, remain quiet on this topic, but the girl's comments rang close enough to his own that he felt to make at least a response. He gave a wavering, weak smile, clearly a little forced.

"And if he's the last of his kind, perhaps it really isn't that bad for him at all. I mean, it could just be better than some of...the alternatives."

"That's the thing, isn't it," Didi said, aiming a slight smile back at the young men. "If it's the last of its kind, maybe it wants to do as much good for the universe as it can before it has to go. We can't know without asking it.

"The question," she added, "is what we should do if we can't communicate with it. But I think we can."

Peter interjected at that point. "If we think it wants to do this, why are we torturing it? Congratulations, you want to help, sit on this electric chair for the rest of your life?"

"Do you think sentient beings have the right to make choices we wouldn't make?" Didi asked. "In general."

"Yes," Peter said. "That's the joy of free will and general freedom. But I'm wondering about the ethics of resorting to torture instead of some other option. Because it can't be just cut and dried, torture or no island. That's too basic."

He was doubling back on his previous statement about no debate, really. But he was thinking a little more clearly now.

"It is, and I feel like there has to be a third way," Didi nodded. "But if the whale volunteered, if it's willing to sacrifice its own comfort so the island can be here ... we should certainly do everything we can to make it comfortable. But I don't know if we should force it to move because watching it makes us uncomfortable."

"I know on my part?" Peter said. "I'd move away if it was still going to be there. I'm glad this is all hypothetical, because if this thing really was under the island I'd probably throw up."

"Okay, but you have someplace to go if you move away, right?" Didi asked. "What about people who don't? Or people who'd be killed or hurt if they went home. They exist. Is it okay to make them leave so we aren't hurting the whale?"

Didi was also glad this was all hypothetical, and she considered that as she continued. "But if the whale doesn't want to be there, or we can't tell, I agree that we should evacuate and find other places for people who can't go home."

Edited 2010-07-27 17:13 (UTC)

"Well, people could always go to different universes," Peter said. "Trapped forever, but it's better than dying."

Ironic. Not that he knew it.

Each jolt to the star whale, each sound it made in response, made Alexander wince and look toward the door with a pained expression that wondered why this couldn't have been the class where they had the option to stay or go.

It wasn't sympathy that made him wince; it was empathy. He wasn't the last of his kind, nor had he been toting along a school and being shocked quite as frequently, but he had been the enslaved whipping boy of a maniacle, tyranical wizard most of his life, and scars like that didn't fade.

And this was another situation not so easily solved by turning someone into a cat, either.

For the longest time, Alexander didn't know what to say. He didn't know what he could say. He just felt that he could only look down at the star whale and think, as if he could communicate with him telepathetically, Well, what do you want, big fellow? Because he remembered, he probably would have never even done anything to change his fate at all until he found out Manannan was going to kill him. Any life at all was fine as long as it was a life, but all of that bordered on too many things he didn't exactly want to bring up and explore in the middle of a class.

"Evacuate the island," Peter said. "And then set it free. No debate."

Torturing a sentient creature for something that was, essentially, a luxury was abhorrent. It felt like... what if everytime you used a remote control, you shocked a puppy?

He stored that thought away, it'd be good in case anyone wanted to argue.

"Agreed," Clark said, looking firm. And really, why repeat what Peter had already said. By his own moral set, it would be wrong to keep anything locked up this way just so they could have the home they liked.

Peter gave Clark a nod, thankful for the agreement. "It's just not worth the cost."

"It's not," Helen agreed. "It has to stop."

She studied the whale with cool eyes that gave away nothing of her thoughts or opinions about the situation.

Most of her suggestions in the attempt to find a possible solution to this dilemma were things that involved rather more than discussion. Rosalind might not have been the most tactful of people around, but it didn’t take a genius to guess that suggesting that they experiment while the whale continued to be in agony would go over well.

Though, she allowed, it would probably go over better than her other thought. Which was: let the whale stay there.

Parker knew she had problems understanding feelings of others and reacting properly to them, but she didn't know how she anyone could react to this other that with shock and horror. "It's wrong," she said. "You can't make something good out of hurting something like that."

Jason was not a naturally compassionate person, but even he had to flinch at the sounds the animal was making. It was different to think about compassion when you were only dealing with people, many of whom were significantly flawed, even if they were nice too. But the star whale clearly couldn't defend itself, and that made Jason's decision a lot harder.

"I guess everyone could go home, and then the creature could be set free," he said. "If everyone had to stay and be cut off from home in order for the whale to be freed, that might be different. Then everyone would suffer."

James winced at the sound. "Turn it off," he said flatly.

"Obviously, now that we're aware of the situation, it's not acceptable to allow it to continue," Jenny said. "Are we referring to the Bleed when you say cut loose between universes? Because I used to live in the Bleed, and can still access Doors through it, so that would fix one of our problems. Otherwise, if it's massive amounts of electricity you need, I volunteer as an alternative power source until we can get a proper baby universe or something in here."

If you want to deal with someone who's visibly irritable today and not likely to be too patient with anyone.

Back tonight, but debating the possibilities and moral issues at hand amongst yourselves might pass the time!

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Practical Crisis Problem Solving - Danger Shop, Tuesday, Period 3 (11am-12pm)

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