POSTING NOTE: Due to work changes, I may not be able to post updates on Tuesdays after Monday night marathon G4 reruns, but updates will occur later in the week.
LOST REBOOT
Recap: Episodes 93-96 (Days ????- - ????)
In 1974, Sawyer perpetuates a lie with some of the other Island survivors in order to protect themselves from mistakes of the past, by joining the Dharma group.
When the O6 arrives, Sawyer is forced to further perpetuate his lie in order to protect them by making them part of Dharma.
Things begin to unravel when Sayid goes rogue and takes matters into their own hands, risking the lives of everyone on the Island. Dharma thinks he is a Hostile.
Kate goes to extreme measures to save Ben's life after he is shot by Sayid when Jack refuses to help. She asks the Hostiles to help Ben. In a house, Hurley and Miles try to figure out the consequences of Ben's shooting and time travel. Sawyer tries to recruit help from Jack, but he refuses telling Kate that he already saved Ben once, and he did it for her. Jack claims that he's done trying to fix things and now puts his trust in the Island. Kate remarks that she doesn't like the new Jack, but Jack reminds her that she didn't like the old him.
Miles argues with Hurley about time travel.
Kate arrives at the infirmary and donates blood to keep young Ben alive. As Kate and Roger sit at Ben's bedside, he admits that he may not have been "the world's greatest father" since Ben stole his keys because of him.
Inside the house, Hurley is trying to understand the unanswered questions of time travel. Miles explains to him that they are in their present while everyone else are in their past. Hurley wonders why a future Ben couldn't remember that Sayid, the guy who tortured him in the future is the same guy who shot him in his past. Miles has no answer.
Juliet is able to stabilize Ben, but can't heal him. Juliet tells Kate that the Others may be able to save his life by bringing him to the Temple. She secretly helps Kate load Ben into a van, and Kate drives out to the sonic fence. Sawyer catches up with her and helps her rather than stopping her. He says that he's doing it for Juliet--because Juliet feels it's wrong to let a child die. Sawyer and Kate bring Ben to the Others.
Science:
Wikipedia reports on a man who weighed deceased souls. In 1901, Duncan MacDougall weighed six patients while they were in the process of dying from tuberculosis in an old age home. It was relatively easy to determine when death was only a few hours away, and at this point the entire bed was placed on an industrial sized scale which was apparently sensitive to the gram. He took his results (a varying amount of perceived mass loss in most of the six cases) to support his hypothesis that the soul had mass, and when the soul departed the body, so did this mass. The determination of the soul weighing 21 grams was based on the average loss of mass in the six patients within moments after death. Experiments on mice and other animals took place. Most notably the weighing upon death of sheep seemed to create mass for a few minutes which later disappeared. The hypothesis was made that a soul portal formed upon death which then whisked the soul away.
MacDougall also measured fifteen dogs in similar circumstances and reported the results as "uniformly negative," with no perceived change in mass. He took these results as confirmation that the soul had weight, and that dogs did not have souls. MacDougall's complaints about not being able to find dogs dying of the natural causes that would have been ideal led one author to conjecture that he was in fact poisoning dogs to conduct these experiments. In March 1907, accounts of MacDougall's experiments were published in the Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research and the medical journal American Medicine, while the news was spread to the general public by New York Times.
His results have never been attempted to be reproduced, and are generally regarded either as meaningless or considered to have had little if any scientific merit. Nonetheless, MacDougall's finding that presumably the human soul weighed 21 grams has become a meme in the public consciousness, mostly due to its claiming the titular thesis in the 2003 film 21 Grams.
Improbabilities:
The time traveling Ben Linus, on the Hydra Island in 2007, would not have any immediate affects from being shot by Sayid in 1977 as a child, including memories if time travel is a string as Daniel states; that you can go back and forth upon the time string, but what happened happened.
Clues:
The Lost explanations of time travel, and then the subsequent breaches of those time travel rules, indicates a) that the viewer is not really seeing time travel but some form of illlusion or b) massive continuity errors in the filler arcs.
The duality of young Ben “dying” in the island past by Sayid, and the severely injured Ben awaking on the Hydra island “the land of the living” after 316 crashes and meets dead Locke (Flocke) indicates that we do not know who is alive or who dead but in a living clone on the island. The idea that the island is the land “of the living” can be a misnomer of dead souls who retain a physical manifestation passing through hell.
Discussion:
“ A chief event of life is the day in which we have encountered a mind that startled us. ”
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
We come to another crossroads. The series is throwing out more and more mysteries, but the show will not conclude like a mystery story. The series is throwing out more and more science fiction attributes, but the show will not conclude like a sci-fi classic. The series is also imparting more adventure sequences, but it is masking “shock plot twists” as drama. Season 5 is the point where many late adopters of the show jumped off the raft.
What Happened, Happened is a misnomer. When Sawyer takes on the sheriff role in 1970s Dharma camp, that changes the past. The time flashing 815ers have a direct causal connection to Sayid shooting Ben as a child. As a result of Jack’s insistence not to intervene (to let the island do its own thing), Kate takes it upon herself to save Ben. This should have fractured their shaky relationship forever.
When I first viewed Season 5, the episodes continue to confirm my suspicion that the show is about the after life. That all the characters are not in the real world; they are all dead. The Egyptian mythology on the afterlife is the basis for the characters journey through the underworld to judgment.
It is not about time travel but re-creation of “place” in order to test the characters (souls) to determine if they are worthy to remain in the afterlife or be destroyed into non-existence.
The concept of “place” over “time” is evident in the clear indication that the Hydra station with polar bear cages in use in 1974-77 with the Sawyer group while Locke and the 316ers are at the abandoned Hydra station in 2005-2008.
Each character is being put into a new situation (place) to determine whether they are able to “Change.” For example, Sawyer’s soul has been reset to a situation or place where a murderous con man can change into a the peaceful, wise sheriff of Dharmaberry. For example, Locke was returned to a “real” world setting with a simple mission to bring people back, but he utterly fails in his own right. He now has an opportunity in a new place with the 316ers where he could change from pathetic suicidal loser into the special leader (a “do over” if you don’t think Locke’s body was taken over by MIB).
It would appear that Widmore, Alpert, Abbadon, Hawking, Brother Campbell are all on the same team. They are all judges from the underworld who are testing the characters to determine whether they are worthy for redemption and rebirth.
While Chang is constructing the Orchid to get to the FDW, Horace is doing 4 a.m. feedings, Sawyer is Andy Griffith, Radzinsky, a security guard, is creating the plans for the Hatch? Does that make any sense?
In 1977, the Hatch was not built yet. How would the Hostiles allow a major underground construction project (remember the massive concrete vaults) on their territory? They would not. The natives would have had to been eliminated in order to construct the hatch.
Radz and Kelvin survived the Purge in 1992. So the Hatch had to be constructed between 1977-1990. Based on the equipment, more towards the early 1980s.
The hatch’s purpose still remains a mystery. Why would you need in a computer age, an operator typing in the numbers every 108 minutes? And why construct your alarm display in hieroglyphs?
In 2001, Desmond replaced Radzinsky at the Hatch. Radz went nuts and allegedly committed suicide. Was he the Faraday of his day?
In 2004, Desmond’s failure to put the numbers in caused 815 to crash.
Now the 815ers of 1977 are in the position of stopping the hatch from being constructed, which would change the future so 815 would not crash.
During the Swan Orientation Film, Dr. Marvin Candle mentioned that there was "an incident" which resulted in the creation of a protocol that required a code to be entered every 108 minutes. The incident involved a leak in the containment associated with an electromagnetic anomaly. The leak caused an unspecified charge to build up within the anomaly. As the charge built up, the magnetic field associated with the anomaly grew. After 108 minutes, the magnetic field was large enough to damage the Swan station. This incident most likely occurred before 1980, the production date of the film. ("What Kate Did")
Dr. Marvin Candle issues a strict warning not to use the computer for communication with the outside world. He goes on to say that failure to comply will compromise the integrity of the project and could result in another incident. Candle also seems to indicate that the incident occurred shortly after the Swan station began operations. ("What Kate Did")
It is unknown exactly what caused the incident to occur or what kind of damage it caused. The protocol was created so that the magnetic anomaly could be discharged every 108 minutes, thus preventing an electromagnetic catastrophe. Failure to comply with this protocol leads to a system failure. There is a failsafe mechanism in place below the floor of the computer room that will destroy the Swan and permanently and safely seal the electromagnetic anomaly. ("Live Together, Die Alone")
1980 Swan orientation references The Incident causing protocol for EM discharge.
Sawyer group Dharma 1974-1977.
The Incident, EM discharge, 1977-1979. (The Orchid? why build Swan on different spot?)
Swan built between 1977-1980 (Why Radz designing station not needed to exist yet?)
Ben buries Orchid box w/ mirror, crackers 1990
Ben orchestrates the purge in 1992.
Radz and Kelvin in Hatch survive the Purge in 1992.
Radz commits suicide 1999-2001
2004 protocol breach caused 815 to crash
Ben builds runway for plane in 2004.
Desmond impodes Hatch with fail safe key in 2004
O6 leave island in 2004-05.
316 crash lands on runway in 2007
Dharma barracks “different” in 2007.
Picture wall: one more recruits photo (6 months after Jack arrives?)
So going back into time to 1977 should have created more massive event distortions in the Lost universe.
Magical/Supernatural/Elements:
Time travel. In all of its inconsistencies.
Dead Locke walking among the island living.
Last lines in episodes:
EP 93:
SAWYER: Yeah. I just... I gotta go.
[He does so.]
EP 94:
SAYID: It's nice to meet you, Ben.
EP 95:
SAYID: I am a killer.
[Sayid looks up and shoots young Ben in the chest once. Ben falls to the floor instantly. Sayid lowers the gun and wipes a tear, then he runs into the jungle, leaving Ben for dead.]
EP 96:
LOCKE: Hello, Ben. Welcome back to the land of the living.
[Ben's eyes open wide as he realizes Locke is alive again.]
New Ideas/Tests of Theories:
In ancient Egyptian religion, names held great power or magic. When a new Pharaoh took the throne, he would erase the name of his predecessor in order to eliminate his power. Likewise, people would not speak a god’s name, but use another name as to not invoke the power or wrath of that god. Also, when you wanted the gods to spite an enemy, you would invoke a curse upon him.
Maybe this ancient concepts are at play in the Lostverse. We have always been bothered by why Hugo is called Hurley in the island world. We know that James Ford took the name of his parents’ killer, Sawyer. But Sawyer’s rise to power coincides with Juliet calling him by his given name, “James.” And it is that simple invocation that gives Sawyer a change in personality to become a well respected member of Dharma, its sheriff, and a long lasting relationship with Juliet.
Hurley winds up as the powerful god-like guardian on the island in the end. Is it the recognition and call of his given name in later episodes that defines his final mission?
The concept that the island “is the land of living” as Flocke tells Ben on the 316 island is probably a great misnomer, too. It may be another lie to invoke a sense of common place in the souls now trapped in the misery of forehell. It is also a control mechanism by those who have actual knowledge that they are dead - - - knowledge is power in the Lost world. Hurley has wavered from thinking he was crazy to thinking that all of the 815ers never left the island, that they were all dead. Hurley’s prophecy will turn to ultimate truth in The End. Viewers probably did not give Hurley enough credit as our proxy in the series.
Gnostic idea that there are two worlds, and the inferior visible world is an illusion. The island world seems more “real” but it is an inferior “illusion” of life as compared to the ending sideways world (after life or purgatory holding dimension). We have seen several references to the island world as being an illusion, a reincarnation, and a place of death. It may be the first place of death in a chain of levels of enlightenment until a final death brings together all the elements to complete one true life (i.e. the sideways church reunion.)
Wednesday, December 26, 2012
Wednesday, December 19, 2012
REBOOT EPISODES 89-92
POSTING NOTE: Due to work changes, I may not be able to post updates on Tuesdays after Monday night marathon G4 reruns, but updates will occur later in the week.
LOST REBOOT
Recap: Episodes 89-92 (Days ????- - ????)
It is difficult to keep track of the time line in the series. There are at least eight time skips in one episode alone.
In 2007, Desmond goes in search of a woman who could be the key in helping Faraday stop the Island's random time skips. In 1954, Miles, Daniel, and Charlotte are taken captive by the Others while Sawyer and Juliet try to save them. Locke meets with Richard, who tells him he must die in order to save the island.
In 2007, Kate attempts to learn who is trying to obtain custody of
Aaron while Ben continues his quest to reunite the O6 so they can all go back to the island. On the island, The dramatic shifts through time place the lives of the remaining Island survivors in extreme peril, forcing Locke to attempt to return to the Orchid in hopes of escaping the Island.
Locke takes on the burden to stop the Island's increasingly violent shifts through time by moving the island once more. In 1988, Jin witnesses the downfall of the freighter science team.
The way back to the Island is revealed to Jack and the other members of the Oceanic 6 but there's trouble ahead when not all of them wish to return.
Science:
Jughead is an atomic missile on the island in 1954. The U.S. military did use uninhabited Pacific Islands as proving grounds for atomic devices during the Cold War. However, the idea that an rogue atomic weapon would be “lost” by the U.S. military is hard to fathom.
Further, the concept of it “leaking” or dangerous was also misplaced. When Daniel and his team are captured by the 1954 Others (Eloise), he notices radiation burns on one of the Others. He concludes that the bomb is a hydrogen bomb and that its casing is cracked. He offers to deactivate the bomb. A nuclear weapon will not detonate because it has been cracked and fissionable material is leaking. On the contrary, the loss of the fissionable material would reduce the likelihood of a detonation because having less special nuclear material present would lessen the probability that a critical mass could be attained. The trigger mechanism for a nuclear device is critical in getting the chain reaction started in order to quickly expand the fusion reaction of materials. So a cracked casing has nothing to do with the trigger mechanism or the ability of the bomb to go off. If the conventional portion of the weapon exploded, it could scatter fissionable material over an area (a "dirty bomb").
In addition, Claymore mines found on the island during this island time would not have been in use by the US Army in 1954. The very basic model M18 was introduced in small numbers as late as 1961.
Improbabilities:
The United States military losing contact with one of their units, 18 soldiers missing in action, let alone leave an armed hydrogen bomb code named “Jughead” on a Pacific island.
Clues:
Episode title: “This Place is Death.” In it, Ben drives a van with the name "Canton-Rainier." This is an anagram for "reincarnation.” The funeral home name “Hoffs-Drawlar” is also an anagram for “flash forward.” As the story moves forward, it finishes in the sideways afterlife world.
Episode title “316.” It is also the most famous bible verse, John 3:16 which states: “For God so loved the world, as to give his only begotten Son; that whosoever believeth in him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting.”
In the Long Beach marina, when Ben and Jack have tried to manipulate part of the O6 to return to the island, there is a boat called ILLUSION. There were other references in this arc to “dreams” and “delusions.”
The poorly drafted and impossible legal fiction that a “secret” custody hearing for Aaron gives an attorney subpoena power to draw blood samples for paternity ruling. Kate buys this con hook line and sinker. In order to have a valid case, a defendant (Kate) needs to be properly served with a summons and copy of complaint filed by a person with “standing” or a legal interest in the case. There are no such people who could claim to be the father of Aaron in Kate’s off-island life. This is another theme of taking us “for a ride” in someone’s personal nightmare.
Discussion:
“ Contempt for happiness is usually contempt for other people's happiness, and is an elegant disguise for hatred of the human race. ”
— Bertrand Russell
As we go through towards the mushy midpoint of Season 5, it appears that the creators wanted to do more “shock twists” than trying to keep any continuity of the criss-crossing story lines.
We will learn that MIB has contempt for the human race. Everyone brought to the island corrupts it. The smoke monster is “the security system” which kills people. The smoke monster is also the mechanism to create replicas of those killed, in physical form with all their memories. When Ajira 316 lands on the Hydra Island, dead Locke (Flocke) appears to those plane survivors, and tells them he remembers than injured passenger, Ben, “was the man who killed me.”
If Alpert told Locke that he had to die in order to bring back his friends to the island, that was a partially true outcome. However, if Alpert told Locke he had to die in order for MIB to take over his memories, position and leadership of the Others (from Jacob), then Alpert was double crossing everyone. In 1954, Alpert was the leader of the Others. At some later time, Ellie and then Widmore were the leaders until Dharma was eliminated by the purge, and Ben assumed the role of leader. And once Ben turned the FDW, he appointed Locke the leader; but in reality, it was ghost Christian who has been guiding Locke, not Jacob.
It brings in a nagging issue for some. Why are some dead people on the island in ghost form without a corpse like Christian, while Flocke apparently needed Locke dead in order to create its appearance? One would think there would be one rule for the reincarnation or fake human.
And then there is the Abaddon-Locke relationship. Abaddon works for Widmore. He was the orderly after Locke was paralyzed. He told Locke about the walkabout in order to get him into position to be on Flight 815. Abaddon tells Locke that he “gets people to where they need to be.” He is a manipulator. So why did he need to get Locke on 815 and crash on the island? So why is he later helping Locke get the other survivors back to the island? Widmore claims that there is a coming “war.” A contest for the island? The end of the world? It is never explained, and in Season 6 no “war” happens. It was more puffery to get a naive Locke to bite on the final con of his existence. For if Widmore needed a dead Locke back on the Island, is he really working with MIB to overthrow Jacob’s power? And why is Ben working with Eloise, who is married to Widmore, in order to get the O6 (“all of them”) back to the island? Widmore sends Desmond to Eloise in LA so he arrives when Ben’s party arrives (more than coincidence).
The reason for getting everyone back to the island was so that the people left behind would not be killed by the time skips. But once Locke turned the FDW, it would appear that problem was solved. The problem with the show construction is that it is edited out of chronological order to create a sense of drama and confusion. One would have thought by now some die-hard Lost fan would have re-edited the series into chronological order in order to see how all the puzzle pieces are really put together. But the ending soured a lot of sci-fi show advocates. Other fans decided to shy away from the nuts and bolts of the stated facts and events, to focus in on the philosophic meaning of the show and its characters than the story lines.
The most important line of this season may have been said by Walt to Locke. Walt told him that he had dreams of Locke on the island “in a suit” surrounded by people who were going to harm him. Later, we would see that image after Ajira crash landed on the island, and Flocke stood on the beach, savoring a mango like it was the first meal it has had in a long, long, time. The concept of Walt “dreaming” future events is not new - - - but here it stands for the proposition that Walt’s mind is controlling future events. Whether those future events are real or imaginary is up for debate. But with all the references to dreams, illusions, delusions, and crazy people references, the bulk of the evidence tends to support the mental side of the debate.
An example of shock of mental snapping is when Ben “saves” Locke from suicide. Locke had failed to get any of his island companions to agree to come back with him. As a result, he was again alone and depressed. His personal belief that he was a failure was reinforced by the failure of this mission. So when Ben stops him, and tells him he will help him, one gets the impression that Ben has a plan. But he does not. He also is at the end of his figurative rope. So when Ben is told by Locke that Locke knows where to go - - - to see Eloise Hawking, Ben snaps and quickly strangles Locke to death. Why? Ben was working with Eloise to get back to the island. Eloise was telling Ben that he needed to get everyone back to the island; just was Widmore had told Locke. There was no reason for Ben to kill Locke since they were on the same team with the same purpose. Then Ben cleans up his crime scene by taking Jin’s ring to manipulate Sun and rigging Locke’s body from the rafter to give the O6 survivors a “guilt” trip - - - an emotional rollercoaster ride that somehow they contributed to Locke’s demise. And Ben would attempt to use it to influence but runs out of time by the marina stand-off.
There is no explanation of why all the 815 survivors need to return to the island. If that was true, then why were not Aaron and Ji Yeon kidnapped by Widmore’s people? And further, why would Sun abandon her young child when she was rich like Widmore and could hire people to go back to the island to rescue Jin. The concept that specific individuals need make the journey is more spiritual than real. Why is Locke’s body needed if Locke’s spirit is gone? And then, when Ben fails his mission, Eloise decides to move forward with less than half the “needed” people.
If we accept the notion that the island is a time machine, one could see the power of using it to go back into time (like in Back to the Future), and manipulate events for fame and fortune. That may have been what Widmore did to be banished from the island. He used the island’s powers to gain vast wealth and influence. But if he knew “the exit point” of the FDW turner, then how hard is it to “find” the island? Ben had no trouble sending Ethan and Alpert on mainland missions recruiting people like Juliet. It is a bothersome detail because in all the island time flashes, the island does not move - - - only a few individuals do. That also does not pass the common sense test. Why are only a few individuals “flash” when they are in the presence of other people who do not? If there are any laws of time and matter, everyone present during the flash would have the same physical properties put upon them. Every human in the presence of a time flash should be treated the same; the same effects and consequences would happen to everyone in that time and space. But it did not. If the physical skips do not apply to everyone in contact with the flash, then they are not truly physical; it is more a vivid mental state. And the fact that those experiences these mental rushes have headaches, dizziness then nose bleeds bolsters that these wild and violent events are in their heads.
The Oxford janitor told Desmond that Daniel’s ill-fated experiences were to have lab rat’s minds “time travel.” When Daniel went to a human trial with his girlfriend, Teresa, she wound up in a coma. As a result, Daniel fled and Widmore paid to clean up his mess. That led Desmond to Eloise’s church from Widmore’s address book, where the islanders were being gathered for a return trip. What is a “constant” in this snippet of story is that Daniel ran away from his love when things got bad. He was a coward. The same is true of the old Desmond; he ran away from Penny because he was a coward.
But mental “mind travel” on the island is physical in nature. Physical objects disappear and re-appear as the flashes end. In order to rectify these inconsistent time travel behaviors, one must look to an unpopular answer: that shown events are not real, but contained in the wild imagination of someone or some thing.
It is not uncommon in literature to have vivid fantasy worlds appear to come to life but in reality do not exist. As discussed in previous reboots, the concept of a coma patient’s subconscious creating a dream state is a possibility since medical science has observed certain brain patterns in that state. Also, we discussed the possibility that people’s minds could be interactively linked to create a game-like, interactive environment to the people involved would seem very real.
If you line up the “special” people identified in the series, one could argue that the entire series revolves around their collective memories and personalities (and personality disorders): Locke, Ben, Hurley and Walt. The one thing they have in common are that they are loners, brought about in part by a parental issues.
One linger issue with the show is its contempt for the children. The characters of Aaron and Ji Yeon are toss-a-way props. Why would a mother, Sun, abandon her young child to go to a dangerous island? Her baby abandonment was based on an unverified statement that Jin is alive because here is his wedding band!? Is there a reason why there is little maternal instinct at play? We will learn that both Claire and Sun give birth in the sideways world. The sideways world is the after life. Why would you need to give birth in the after life if your child was already born in real life? That makes no sense unless you think that the island world births are not real, but an illusion of motherhood. It is also a cruel illusion of fatherhood as well, as in the sideways world Jack has a son. A son will believe in the end is merely a fiction of a world the characters created to hold their souls until Jack arrived to be awakened.
Magical/Supernatural/Elements:
The concept that the island is “time skipping” because of what Ben did with the frozen donkey wheel. The inconsistent explanation by Daniel was that time is a string; you can go back and forth along it, but you can never “change” the past (Eloise’s “course correction” narrative to Desmond). But he also says that time is like a record that is skipping, which infers a circular or non-linear aspect to time and space.
That the smoke monster can take multiple human forms, as it “infected” all of Rousseau’s crew as shown in the Jin flash story. Which leads to the idea that everyone on the island is a human clone created by the (crazy) smoke monster.
Ajira passengers seeing the O6 survivors “vanish” during the crash landing on the island. Is this what happened when Flight 815 crashed - - - that certain people were teleported off the plane and to the island?
Last lines in episodes:
EP 89:
FARADAY: It's okay. It's okay. Charlotte!
[He picks her up and hugs her close to him.]
EP 90:
YOUNG WOMAN: Hello, Jin. I'm Danielle. Danielle Rousseau.
[Jin stares in shock.]
EP 91:
ELOISE: [Sighs] Well, I suppose it will have to do for now. All right! Let's get started.
EP 92:
HURLEY: Jin?
[Jin lowers the rifle and looks surprised/happy. He's wearing a DHARMA jumpsuit, but we can't see the symbol.]
New Ideas/Tests of Theories:
When the island flashed and helicopter crashed, are we certain that the Oceanic 6 was found by Penny’s boat in the island time-world? Eloise, in the church, tells Ben that all of the island survivors need to return to the island or “god help us all.” Why is it important that everyone on 815 and Ben return to the island?
From the Orchid Dharma video, we are told that time traveling bunny must not come into contact with non-time traveling self in the same location. The intersection of time traveling self and self is supposedly catastrophic.
When Eloise tells Desmond in London about “course correction” and a man dies, is she telling him what happens when people come into contact with themselves, or “bridge” the island world and sideways dimension? And further, Eloise tells Desmond that he needs to leave Penny and push the Hatch button “in order to save the world.” But now, which world? Eloise is a puppet master in both realms.
When in Season 6, Eloise tells sideways world Desmond not to “wake” the island others because she could “lose” her son, Daniel, with the island people. Is “waking” really “merging” two consciousnesses in the afterlife?
We can assume that the island is on the edge of an inter-dimensional portal. But we cannot fully assume that the flashbacks and flash forwards are all in one dimension.
For example, if Eloise-Desmond conversation in London was actually in the sideways world, Eloise manipulation of Dez may have put him “through” the portal and into the island dimension, to be trapped on the island for perpetuity (and away from her sideways family).
The same could be said of Flight 815. Christian died in Australia. His spirit may have gathered the passengers together on the ill-fated plane, knowing that it would transported to the island realm from the sideways world. It could be possible that all of the passengers on 815 departed from the sideways world as “lost souls” to be deposited in the island dimension due to Desmond’s EM discharge.
The whole idea of the island as a prison, a place where people cannot leave, was first directed toward MIB (or the smoke monster). The devil it is said was cast out from heaven; banished to rule the underworld, never to return to paradise.
And since we have the roaming dead in the island realm, when they die in this dimension their souls may manifest themselves in the sideways world because that dimension is the afterlife waiting room. And if the island was spacetime skipping, the sideways world flight 815 that actually lands in LA is explained as being consistent with the fact that all the passengers died or were already dead on the island 815 crash.
Thus, the dangerous duality of time traveling souls meeting each other in one singularity. Desmond’s mind “flashes” are believed to be real “memories,” but from another dimension of existence. So that is why so many are false, like the the image of Claire taking Aaron on a helicopter off the island.
There appears to be two characters who have a grasp of manipulating people in both dimensions: Eloise and Christian. They appear at critical times pre-Flight 815, on-island, off-island and in the sideways world.
If the Lost mythology actually begins in the sideways world, that could be considered a theoretical game changer. For if one dies on the island, only a partial soul is sent back to the sideways world (one without a memory of the island), and part of the soul may be “reincarnated” as an incomplete self.
Ben Linus may be an example of this “special” circumstance. His “birth” prematurely in a forest may have led to his “death.” He begins his “life” in the sideways world with his dead father, who is conned into going “to the island” by Horace, who may be working for the Widmores (or at least Eloise). Ben may be seen as an element to control people who are later shipped to the island for captivity. On the island, Ben is unhappy and easily manipulated by the Others. When Ben is shot (and killed) by time traveling Sayid, he is taken to the Temple for “reincarnation.” But part of Ben’s childhood soul is transported back to the sideways world, where he grows up to become a meek school teacher, while part of his soul is reanimated as an evil man.
If we look to the sideways world as a pre-paradise, it fits into the notion that the ancient Egyptians had to the various levels of the afterlife. One had the common people coming to a land to tend the fields much they did on earth, with new lives, families and all the aspects of their life on earth. The sideways world has those components, but in a modern setting.
If one knows about the nexus between the island world and the sideways world, control of this portal is the key to obtaining immortality. This may have been found by the ancient Egyptians, and its secret passed down through the ages in both the island and sideways realms. Souls in the sideways world may fear the next step in the after life (for if the sideways world is heaven, is the next stage of moving on “non-existence?”) In order to stop the process of a finite eternity, souls go back through the portal to the sever the conscious fact that they are already dead. It is a self-con in order to stop the process of moving on in the after life journey.
What happens when a mother crosses back over to the island realm only to kill her time skipping son? Eloise does everything in her knowledge and power to keep sideways Daniel from re-connecting with his island consciousness. Those memories would doom her to lose her son to the 815 cast and/or Charlotte.
The idea that the protagonists that are pushing the story lines are from the sideways world and not from earth is a new twist. Most viewers believe that the story is about Jack and the 815 survivors, who had a dramatic journey battling beasts, themselves and evil in order to be reunited in heaven. But an objective view of the story arcs shows that Jack and 815 survivors, as well as the Others and Alpert, are merely pawns in a grand scheme. They may “think” they know what is going on (like Ben), but they are unable to grasp where they are or what the island is in relation to the story conclusion.
When these episodes first aired, I made the following observations and analysis. On re-watch, it is apparent that the show is heading towards Egyptian myths with the hieroglyphs seen in the FDW chamber and on the wall where Smokey took the French crew.
As with a show like Lost, there are three components in play: the story principles/mythology; the story mechanics; and the plot /struggle within the confines of the mythology and mechanics. The problem with the show is that the storytelling techniques are overwhelming the story. Trying to find a rational basis for all three components is the real mystery to the show. The conclusion: our perception is not the show’s true reality.
1. The mechanics of the island. There is an alternative explanation to the worm hole, exotic matter theory: Tesla coils. It is interesting to note that Nikola Tesla, who was a Utopian thinker, was fascinated with the idea of light as both a particle and a wave, the fundamental proposition of what would become quantum physics. He had the idea of creating a "wall of light" by manipulating electromagnetic waves in a certain pattern. This mysterious wall of light would enable time, space, gravity and matter to be altered at will, and engendered an array of Tesla proposals that seem to leap straight out of science fiction, including anti-gravity airships, teleportation, time travel and an impenetrable force field (he conceived of a transmitter tower that could produce a dome force field). One of Tesla's better known experiments regards his famed Wardenclyffe tower. The coil, would re-amplify the earth’s natural electric current, and send it back into the planet to increase its power. After several cycles, Tesla's Wardenclyffe tower was producing millions of volts of electricity, and actually creating electrical arcs of up to 30 feet with a higher voltage than natural lightning.
If the FDW and the Hatch are/were Tesla coils designed to alter time, space, gravity and matter, within the universe of the island. Both locations serve as gates to different levels of eternity. Both locations contained hieroglyphs which reference Egyptian beliefs in death. A Tesla coil, which is focusing energy into the ground, would explain why the Hatch “imploded” rather than exploding when Desmond used the fail safe key. The effect we see during the “time skips” is a huge wall of light that engulfs the characters perception of time and space.
In addition, the Numbers from the Hatch were thought to be part of the Valenzetti Equation. But it also could be part of the spells, charms or formulas of the ancient Egyptians who had a series of sacred or magical numbers: 2, 3, 4, 7 and their multiples and sums. The mechanics of imputing the Numbers in the Hatch was to avoid opening a closed gate from some dangerous situation from the underworld. The fail safe key implosion permanently sealed that gate so a deity could not use it to invade the island.
2. The Numbers. The ancient Egyptians had their sacred numbers. And a few had special meaning:
Three (3) meant plurality, meaning the triad of deities or a “complete system.” (This may be why Christian tells Locke to bring back all of the O6, so he does not forget Jack, the only one he cares about because with Jack, Christian would have made his triad with himself and Claire.)
Five (5) was the symbol for the star or pentagram which meant the afterlife. (Here we are in Season 5 Episode 5 and it is titled “This Place is Death.” A sledgehammer hint, perhaps?)
Seven (7) was the symbol for perfection, effectiveness and completeness. We thought 70 hours seemed an odd number for Hawkings calculation. But the number 70 has some context in Egyptian mythology: the underworld god of wisdom, Thoth, who knows everything about all things, tricked the moon god to add five calendar days in 70 seconds. (Thoth is one of the underworld gods who escorts the sun god through the underworld on each nightly passage. He would know everything about everyone in this domain.)
3. The principles of the island. The concept of “sacrifice” and dying in order to leave the island (the Kingdom of the Dead) is core to ancient Egyptian religions. When a person dies, the deceased goes to the Kingdom of the Dead where his ba (personality) joins his ka (body double) to regain movement and speech. The deceased is made “to live again so that they may arise, reborn, with the morning sun.” The souls who come here must work for the god of the underworld as payback for “protection” against danger and evil spirits or gods.
There are twelve (12) sections of the land of the dead (or gates) to pass before arriving at final judgment. Arriving at one’s reward is said to be a demanding ordeal, requiring a “sin free” heart and the ability to traverse the trials of the underworld (with reciting spells, passwords,or formulae from the Book of the Dead.) Because of the dangers posed in this world, the deceased were buried with possession that they would need to protect themselves. (In Egyptian rites, you bring to the afterlife the material possessions you have at the time you die. The rule that the time skippers jumping only with the possession they have with them is like this Egyptian death belief.) Once the deceased completes his or her journey, he or she travels across the sky in the sun ark as one the blessed dead, and that evening travels to the underworld for final judgment before Osirus. Final judgment is either vindication (heaven) or eaten by a soul eater (to have a non-existence) Apep, is a god of the underworld that is the personification of all evil and darkness, shown as a giant snake or serpent, who attacks those souls who journey in his realm. This may be Smokey’s role in the island world.
4. Travel and Time. There is a simple principle unfolding on traveling to and from the island: you have to die. Which brings to the forefront the whole concept of death itself. When you die, are you really dead? Maybe as rites of passage, you have to have “multiple” passings or deaths (through the afterlife trials and gates) in order to be more enlightened (more a spiritual being). This concept of rites and ordeals of passage in the underworld leads to the final component: (I think that bringing an embalmed body into the island sphere creates a magical spirit - - - Christian, for example; and shortly, Locke). At the end of the episode, Mrs. Hawking has the sociopath's smirk of serial killer.
We may not be seeing actual “time travel” as we perceive it. We are seeing immortal time being reconstructed from the entire wisdom and knowledge base of the world and all the lost souls. (Think, St. Peter at the gate of heaven or Thoth, the god of wisdom in the underworld, as knowing everything you did in your mortal life and storing that information for time of final judgment).
5. The conflict. If the island is the symbolic representation of the underworld, the relative conflict is who controls it. The hidden secrets, the ordeals, and the mind games (including the deals, with the devil so to speak) are elements to keep the lost souls on the island from figuring out what is really happening to them and the island. A good soldier just does what he is told to do. The island setting may be a microsphere of such a conflict: who controls a segment of sacred, therefore, powerful location in the realm of the afterlife.
We have a mix of good, bad and evil. We also have a mix of strong religious belief systems. Ancient Egyptian, Judea-Christian and Utopian (Dharma). We have an ancient culture of souls (Alpert), in battle with arrivals of Dharma souls and now the 815ers. Since the deceased brings with them their personality and knowledge, it would also bring their beliefs . . . including humanity’s never ending Holy Wars. However, a person’s beliefs do not necessary create wisdom: the reality of what is really happening to them. Only those who understand their plight (being dead) can grow in wisdom and transverse the perils through this dimension towards peace. I think that Rose is the only 815er who understood their situation from Day One.
After re-watching Lost to this point, the alleged “conflict” and pending “war” are overblown. If the island has the power over life and death (such as stopping Michael from committing suicide in NYC), then why does it need protection from one person like Widmore? Unless the conflict in personal or an internal mental conflict within one’s self, we have a faux filler story arc to complete the season.
And the time travel elements make less sense today than when they first aired in TV.
The idea that Walt’s dreams are creating waking events to the 815 characters is intriguing; it would also explain why Michael could not kill himself in NYC. Walt would not let him. But when Locke meets Walt after school, Walt knows what will happen to Locke, but he does not know what has happened to his father. Is Walt’s subconscious mind controlling the events?
In a dream state, anything is possible including time travel, smoke monsters, temples, evil people, ship wrecks, murder and violence. And in a dream state, there is no moral component of judgment. As the numerous bad acts that the characters will do in the series, none of them are “punished” for their sins. It may be that Walt is the dream maker in this whole story; once his father is out of his life, he mentally kills him off and continues the adventures of his island friends.
LOST REBOOT
Recap: Episodes 89-92 (Days ????- - ????)
It is difficult to keep track of the time line in the series. There are at least eight time skips in one episode alone.
In 2007, Desmond goes in search of a woman who could be the key in helping Faraday stop the Island's random time skips. In 1954, Miles, Daniel, and Charlotte are taken captive by the Others while Sawyer and Juliet try to save them. Locke meets with Richard, who tells him he must die in order to save the island.
In 2007, Kate attempts to learn who is trying to obtain custody of
Aaron while Ben continues his quest to reunite the O6 so they can all go back to the island. On the island, The dramatic shifts through time place the lives of the remaining Island survivors in extreme peril, forcing Locke to attempt to return to the Orchid in hopes of escaping the Island.
Locke takes on the burden to stop the Island's increasingly violent shifts through time by moving the island once more. In 1988, Jin witnesses the downfall of the freighter science team.
The way back to the Island is revealed to Jack and the other members of the Oceanic 6 but there's trouble ahead when not all of them wish to return.
Science:
Jughead is an atomic missile on the island in 1954. The U.S. military did use uninhabited Pacific Islands as proving grounds for atomic devices during the Cold War. However, the idea that an rogue atomic weapon would be “lost” by the U.S. military is hard to fathom.
Further, the concept of it “leaking” or dangerous was also misplaced. When Daniel and his team are captured by the 1954 Others (Eloise), he notices radiation burns on one of the Others. He concludes that the bomb is a hydrogen bomb and that its casing is cracked. He offers to deactivate the bomb. A nuclear weapon will not detonate because it has been cracked and fissionable material is leaking. On the contrary, the loss of the fissionable material would reduce the likelihood of a detonation because having less special nuclear material present would lessen the probability that a critical mass could be attained. The trigger mechanism for a nuclear device is critical in getting the chain reaction started in order to quickly expand the fusion reaction of materials. So a cracked casing has nothing to do with the trigger mechanism or the ability of the bomb to go off. If the conventional portion of the weapon exploded, it could scatter fissionable material over an area (a "dirty bomb").
In addition, Claymore mines found on the island during this island time would not have been in use by the US Army in 1954. The very basic model M18 was introduced in small numbers as late as 1961.
Improbabilities:
The United States military losing contact with one of their units, 18 soldiers missing in action, let alone leave an armed hydrogen bomb code named “Jughead” on a Pacific island.
Clues:
Episode title: “This Place is Death.” In it, Ben drives a van with the name "Canton-Rainier." This is an anagram for "reincarnation.” The funeral home name “Hoffs-Drawlar” is also an anagram for “flash forward.” As the story moves forward, it finishes in the sideways afterlife world.
Episode title “316.” It is also the most famous bible verse, John 3:16 which states: “For God so loved the world, as to give his only begotten Son; that whosoever believeth in him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting.”
In the Long Beach marina, when Ben and Jack have tried to manipulate part of the O6 to return to the island, there is a boat called ILLUSION. There were other references in this arc to “dreams” and “delusions.”
The poorly drafted and impossible legal fiction that a “secret” custody hearing for Aaron gives an attorney subpoena power to draw blood samples for paternity ruling. Kate buys this con hook line and sinker. In order to have a valid case, a defendant (Kate) needs to be properly served with a summons and copy of complaint filed by a person with “standing” or a legal interest in the case. There are no such people who could claim to be the father of Aaron in Kate’s off-island life. This is another theme of taking us “for a ride” in someone’s personal nightmare.
Discussion:
“ Contempt for happiness is usually contempt for other people's happiness, and is an elegant disguise for hatred of the human race. ”
— Bertrand Russell
As we go through towards the mushy midpoint of Season 5, it appears that the creators wanted to do more “shock twists” than trying to keep any continuity of the criss-crossing story lines.
We will learn that MIB has contempt for the human race. Everyone brought to the island corrupts it. The smoke monster is “the security system” which kills people. The smoke monster is also the mechanism to create replicas of those killed, in physical form with all their memories. When Ajira 316 lands on the Hydra Island, dead Locke (Flocke) appears to those plane survivors, and tells them he remembers than injured passenger, Ben, “was the man who killed me.”
If Alpert told Locke that he had to die in order to bring back his friends to the island, that was a partially true outcome. However, if Alpert told Locke he had to die in order for MIB to take over his memories, position and leadership of the Others (from Jacob), then Alpert was double crossing everyone. In 1954, Alpert was the leader of the Others. At some later time, Ellie and then Widmore were the leaders until Dharma was eliminated by the purge, and Ben assumed the role of leader. And once Ben turned the FDW, he appointed Locke the leader; but in reality, it was ghost Christian who has been guiding Locke, not Jacob.
It brings in a nagging issue for some. Why are some dead people on the island in ghost form without a corpse like Christian, while Flocke apparently needed Locke dead in order to create its appearance? One would think there would be one rule for the reincarnation or fake human.
And then there is the Abaddon-Locke relationship. Abaddon works for Widmore. He was the orderly after Locke was paralyzed. He told Locke about the walkabout in order to get him into position to be on Flight 815. Abaddon tells Locke that he “gets people to where they need to be.” He is a manipulator. So why did he need to get Locke on 815 and crash on the island? So why is he later helping Locke get the other survivors back to the island? Widmore claims that there is a coming “war.” A contest for the island? The end of the world? It is never explained, and in Season 6 no “war” happens. It was more puffery to get a naive Locke to bite on the final con of his existence. For if Widmore needed a dead Locke back on the Island, is he really working with MIB to overthrow Jacob’s power? And why is Ben working with Eloise, who is married to Widmore, in order to get the O6 (“all of them”) back to the island? Widmore sends Desmond to Eloise in LA so he arrives when Ben’s party arrives (more than coincidence).
The reason for getting everyone back to the island was so that the people left behind would not be killed by the time skips. But once Locke turned the FDW, it would appear that problem was solved. The problem with the show construction is that it is edited out of chronological order to create a sense of drama and confusion. One would have thought by now some die-hard Lost fan would have re-edited the series into chronological order in order to see how all the puzzle pieces are really put together. But the ending soured a lot of sci-fi show advocates. Other fans decided to shy away from the nuts and bolts of the stated facts and events, to focus in on the philosophic meaning of the show and its characters than the story lines.
The most important line of this season may have been said by Walt to Locke. Walt told him that he had dreams of Locke on the island “in a suit” surrounded by people who were going to harm him. Later, we would see that image after Ajira crash landed on the island, and Flocke stood on the beach, savoring a mango like it was the first meal it has had in a long, long, time. The concept of Walt “dreaming” future events is not new - - - but here it stands for the proposition that Walt’s mind is controlling future events. Whether those future events are real or imaginary is up for debate. But with all the references to dreams, illusions, delusions, and crazy people references, the bulk of the evidence tends to support the mental side of the debate.
An example of shock of mental snapping is when Ben “saves” Locke from suicide. Locke had failed to get any of his island companions to agree to come back with him. As a result, he was again alone and depressed. His personal belief that he was a failure was reinforced by the failure of this mission. So when Ben stops him, and tells him he will help him, one gets the impression that Ben has a plan. But he does not. He also is at the end of his figurative rope. So when Ben is told by Locke that Locke knows where to go - - - to see Eloise Hawking, Ben snaps and quickly strangles Locke to death. Why? Ben was working with Eloise to get back to the island. Eloise was telling Ben that he needed to get everyone back to the island; just was Widmore had told Locke. There was no reason for Ben to kill Locke since they were on the same team with the same purpose. Then Ben cleans up his crime scene by taking Jin’s ring to manipulate Sun and rigging Locke’s body from the rafter to give the O6 survivors a “guilt” trip - - - an emotional rollercoaster ride that somehow they contributed to Locke’s demise. And Ben would attempt to use it to influence but runs out of time by the marina stand-off.
There is no explanation of why all the 815 survivors need to return to the island. If that was true, then why were not Aaron and Ji Yeon kidnapped by Widmore’s people? And further, why would Sun abandon her young child when she was rich like Widmore and could hire people to go back to the island to rescue Jin. The concept that specific individuals need make the journey is more spiritual than real. Why is Locke’s body needed if Locke’s spirit is gone? And then, when Ben fails his mission, Eloise decides to move forward with less than half the “needed” people.
If we accept the notion that the island is a time machine, one could see the power of using it to go back into time (like in Back to the Future), and manipulate events for fame and fortune. That may have been what Widmore did to be banished from the island. He used the island’s powers to gain vast wealth and influence. But if he knew “the exit point” of the FDW turner, then how hard is it to “find” the island? Ben had no trouble sending Ethan and Alpert on mainland missions recruiting people like Juliet. It is a bothersome detail because in all the island time flashes, the island does not move - - - only a few individuals do. That also does not pass the common sense test. Why are only a few individuals “flash” when they are in the presence of other people who do not? If there are any laws of time and matter, everyone present during the flash would have the same physical properties put upon them. Every human in the presence of a time flash should be treated the same; the same effects and consequences would happen to everyone in that time and space. But it did not. If the physical skips do not apply to everyone in contact with the flash, then they are not truly physical; it is more a vivid mental state. And the fact that those experiences these mental rushes have headaches, dizziness then nose bleeds bolsters that these wild and violent events are in their heads.
The Oxford janitor told Desmond that Daniel’s ill-fated experiences were to have lab rat’s minds “time travel.” When Daniel went to a human trial with his girlfriend, Teresa, she wound up in a coma. As a result, Daniel fled and Widmore paid to clean up his mess. That led Desmond to Eloise’s church from Widmore’s address book, where the islanders were being gathered for a return trip. What is a “constant” in this snippet of story is that Daniel ran away from his love when things got bad. He was a coward. The same is true of the old Desmond; he ran away from Penny because he was a coward.
But mental “mind travel” on the island is physical in nature. Physical objects disappear and re-appear as the flashes end. In order to rectify these inconsistent time travel behaviors, one must look to an unpopular answer: that shown events are not real, but contained in the wild imagination of someone or some thing.
It is not uncommon in literature to have vivid fantasy worlds appear to come to life but in reality do not exist. As discussed in previous reboots, the concept of a coma patient’s subconscious creating a dream state is a possibility since medical science has observed certain brain patterns in that state. Also, we discussed the possibility that people’s minds could be interactively linked to create a game-like, interactive environment to the people involved would seem very real.
If you line up the “special” people identified in the series, one could argue that the entire series revolves around their collective memories and personalities (and personality disorders): Locke, Ben, Hurley and Walt. The one thing they have in common are that they are loners, brought about in part by a parental issues.
One linger issue with the show is its contempt for the children. The characters of Aaron and Ji Yeon are toss-a-way props. Why would a mother, Sun, abandon her young child to go to a dangerous island? Her baby abandonment was based on an unverified statement that Jin is alive because here is his wedding band!? Is there a reason why there is little maternal instinct at play? We will learn that both Claire and Sun give birth in the sideways world. The sideways world is the after life. Why would you need to give birth in the after life if your child was already born in real life? That makes no sense unless you think that the island world births are not real, but an illusion of motherhood. It is also a cruel illusion of fatherhood as well, as in the sideways world Jack has a son. A son will believe in the end is merely a fiction of a world the characters created to hold their souls until Jack arrived to be awakened.
Magical/Supernatural/Elements:
The concept that the island is “time skipping” because of what Ben did with the frozen donkey wheel. The inconsistent explanation by Daniel was that time is a string; you can go back and forth along it, but you can never “change” the past (Eloise’s “course correction” narrative to Desmond). But he also says that time is like a record that is skipping, which infers a circular or non-linear aspect to time and space.
That the smoke monster can take multiple human forms, as it “infected” all of Rousseau’s crew as shown in the Jin flash story. Which leads to the idea that everyone on the island is a human clone created by the (crazy) smoke monster.
Ajira passengers seeing the O6 survivors “vanish” during the crash landing on the island. Is this what happened when Flight 815 crashed - - - that certain people were teleported off the plane and to the island?
Last lines in episodes:
EP 89:
FARADAY: It's okay. It's okay. Charlotte!
[He picks her up and hugs her close to him.]
EP 90:
YOUNG WOMAN: Hello, Jin. I'm Danielle. Danielle Rousseau.
[Jin stares in shock.]
EP 91:
ELOISE: [Sighs] Well, I suppose it will have to do for now. All right! Let's get started.
EP 92:
HURLEY: Jin?
[Jin lowers the rifle and looks surprised/happy. He's wearing a DHARMA jumpsuit, but we can't see the symbol.]
New Ideas/Tests of Theories:
When the island flashed and helicopter crashed, are we certain that the Oceanic 6 was found by Penny’s boat in the island time-world? Eloise, in the church, tells Ben that all of the island survivors need to return to the island or “god help us all.” Why is it important that everyone on 815 and Ben return to the island?
From the Orchid Dharma video, we are told that time traveling bunny must not come into contact with non-time traveling self in the same location. The intersection of time traveling self and self is supposedly catastrophic.
When Eloise tells Desmond in London about “course correction” and a man dies, is she telling him what happens when people come into contact with themselves, or “bridge” the island world and sideways dimension? And further, Eloise tells Desmond that he needs to leave Penny and push the Hatch button “in order to save the world.” But now, which world? Eloise is a puppet master in both realms.
When in Season 6, Eloise tells sideways world Desmond not to “wake” the island others because she could “lose” her son, Daniel, with the island people. Is “waking” really “merging” two consciousnesses in the afterlife?
We can assume that the island is on the edge of an inter-dimensional portal. But we cannot fully assume that the flashbacks and flash forwards are all in one dimension.
For example, if Eloise-Desmond conversation in London was actually in the sideways world, Eloise manipulation of Dez may have put him “through” the portal and into the island dimension, to be trapped on the island for perpetuity (and away from her sideways family).
The same could be said of Flight 815. Christian died in Australia. His spirit may have gathered the passengers together on the ill-fated plane, knowing that it would transported to the island realm from the sideways world. It could be possible that all of the passengers on 815 departed from the sideways world as “lost souls” to be deposited in the island dimension due to Desmond’s EM discharge.
The whole idea of the island as a prison, a place where people cannot leave, was first directed toward MIB (or the smoke monster). The devil it is said was cast out from heaven; banished to rule the underworld, never to return to paradise.
And since we have the roaming dead in the island realm, when they die in this dimension their souls may manifest themselves in the sideways world because that dimension is the afterlife waiting room. And if the island was spacetime skipping, the sideways world flight 815 that actually lands in LA is explained as being consistent with the fact that all the passengers died or were already dead on the island 815 crash.
Thus, the dangerous duality of time traveling souls meeting each other in one singularity. Desmond’s mind “flashes” are believed to be real “memories,” but from another dimension of existence. So that is why so many are false, like the the image of Claire taking Aaron on a helicopter off the island.
There appears to be two characters who have a grasp of manipulating people in both dimensions: Eloise and Christian. They appear at critical times pre-Flight 815, on-island, off-island and in the sideways world.
If the Lost mythology actually begins in the sideways world, that could be considered a theoretical game changer. For if one dies on the island, only a partial soul is sent back to the sideways world (one without a memory of the island), and part of the soul may be “reincarnated” as an incomplete self.
Ben Linus may be an example of this “special” circumstance. His “birth” prematurely in a forest may have led to his “death.” He begins his “life” in the sideways world with his dead father, who is conned into going “to the island” by Horace, who may be working for the Widmores (or at least Eloise). Ben may be seen as an element to control people who are later shipped to the island for captivity. On the island, Ben is unhappy and easily manipulated by the Others. When Ben is shot (and killed) by time traveling Sayid, he is taken to the Temple for “reincarnation.” But part of Ben’s childhood soul is transported back to the sideways world, where he grows up to become a meek school teacher, while part of his soul is reanimated as an evil man.
If we look to the sideways world as a pre-paradise, it fits into the notion that the ancient Egyptians had to the various levels of the afterlife. One had the common people coming to a land to tend the fields much they did on earth, with new lives, families and all the aspects of their life on earth. The sideways world has those components, but in a modern setting.
If one knows about the nexus between the island world and the sideways world, control of this portal is the key to obtaining immortality. This may have been found by the ancient Egyptians, and its secret passed down through the ages in both the island and sideways realms. Souls in the sideways world may fear the next step in the after life (for if the sideways world is heaven, is the next stage of moving on “non-existence?”) In order to stop the process of a finite eternity, souls go back through the portal to the sever the conscious fact that they are already dead. It is a self-con in order to stop the process of moving on in the after life journey.
What happens when a mother crosses back over to the island realm only to kill her time skipping son? Eloise does everything in her knowledge and power to keep sideways Daniel from re-connecting with his island consciousness. Those memories would doom her to lose her son to the 815 cast and/or Charlotte.
The idea that the protagonists that are pushing the story lines are from the sideways world and not from earth is a new twist. Most viewers believe that the story is about Jack and the 815 survivors, who had a dramatic journey battling beasts, themselves and evil in order to be reunited in heaven. But an objective view of the story arcs shows that Jack and 815 survivors, as well as the Others and Alpert, are merely pawns in a grand scheme. They may “think” they know what is going on (like Ben), but they are unable to grasp where they are or what the island is in relation to the story conclusion.
When these episodes first aired, I made the following observations and analysis. On re-watch, it is apparent that the show is heading towards Egyptian myths with the hieroglyphs seen in the FDW chamber and on the wall where Smokey took the French crew.
As with a show like Lost, there are three components in play: the story principles/mythology; the story mechanics; and the plot /struggle within the confines of the mythology and mechanics. The problem with the show is that the storytelling techniques are overwhelming the story. Trying to find a rational basis for all three components is the real mystery to the show. The conclusion: our perception is not the show’s true reality.
1. The mechanics of the island. There is an alternative explanation to the worm hole, exotic matter theory: Tesla coils. It is interesting to note that Nikola Tesla, who was a Utopian thinker, was fascinated with the idea of light as both a particle and a wave, the fundamental proposition of what would become quantum physics. He had the idea of creating a "wall of light" by manipulating electromagnetic waves in a certain pattern. This mysterious wall of light would enable time, space, gravity and matter to be altered at will, and engendered an array of Tesla proposals that seem to leap straight out of science fiction, including anti-gravity airships, teleportation, time travel and an impenetrable force field (he conceived of a transmitter tower that could produce a dome force field). One of Tesla's better known experiments regards his famed Wardenclyffe tower. The coil, would re-amplify the earth’s natural electric current, and send it back into the planet to increase its power. After several cycles, Tesla's Wardenclyffe tower was producing millions of volts of electricity, and actually creating electrical arcs of up to 30 feet with a higher voltage than natural lightning.
If the FDW and the Hatch are/were Tesla coils designed to alter time, space, gravity and matter, within the universe of the island. Both locations serve as gates to different levels of eternity. Both locations contained hieroglyphs which reference Egyptian beliefs in death. A Tesla coil, which is focusing energy into the ground, would explain why the Hatch “imploded” rather than exploding when Desmond used the fail safe key. The effect we see during the “time skips” is a huge wall of light that engulfs the characters perception of time and space.
In addition, the Numbers from the Hatch were thought to be part of the Valenzetti Equation. But it also could be part of the spells, charms or formulas of the ancient Egyptians who had a series of sacred or magical numbers: 2, 3, 4, 7 and their multiples and sums. The mechanics of imputing the Numbers in the Hatch was to avoid opening a closed gate from some dangerous situation from the underworld. The fail safe key implosion permanently sealed that gate so a deity could not use it to invade the island.
2. The Numbers. The ancient Egyptians had their sacred numbers. And a few had special meaning:
Three (3) meant plurality, meaning the triad of deities or a “complete system.” (This may be why Christian tells Locke to bring back all of the O6, so he does not forget Jack, the only one he cares about because with Jack, Christian would have made his triad with himself and Claire.)
Five (5) was the symbol for the star or pentagram which meant the afterlife. (Here we are in Season 5 Episode 5 and it is titled “This Place is Death.” A sledgehammer hint, perhaps?)
Seven (7) was the symbol for perfection, effectiveness and completeness. We thought 70 hours seemed an odd number for Hawkings calculation. But the number 70 has some context in Egyptian mythology: the underworld god of wisdom, Thoth, who knows everything about all things, tricked the moon god to add five calendar days in 70 seconds. (Thoth is one of the underworld gods who escorts the sun god through the underworld on each nightly passage. He would know everything about everyone in this domain.)
3. The principles of the island. The concept of “sacrifice” and dying in order to leave the island (the Kingdom of the Dead) is core to ancient Egyptian religions. When a person dies, the deceased goes to the Kingdom of the Dead where his ba (personality) joins his ka (body double) to regain movement and speech. The deceased is made “to live again so that they may arise, reborn, with the morning sun.” The souls who come here must work for the god of the underworld as payback for “protection” against danger and evil spirits or gods.
There are twelve (12) sections of the land of the dead (or gates) to pass before arriving at final judgment. Arriving at one’s reward is said to be a demanding ordeal, requiring a “sin free” heart and the ability to traverse the trials of the underworld (with reciting spells, passwords,or formulae from the Book of the Dead.) Because of the dangers posed in this world, the deceased were buried with possession that they would need to protect themselves. (In Egyptian rites, you bring to the afterlife the material possessions you have at the time you die. The rule that the time skippers jumping only with the possession they have with them is like this Egyptian death belief.) Once the deceased completes his or her journey, he or she travels across the sky in the sun ark as one the blessed dead, and that evening travels to the underworld for final judgment before Osirus. Final judgment is either vindication (heaven) or eaten by a soul eater (to have a non-existence) Apep, is a god of the underworld that is the personification of all evil and darkness, shown as a giant snake or serpent, who attacks those souls who journey in his realm. This may be Smokey’s role in the island world.
4. Travel and Time. There is a simple principle unfolding on traveling to and from the island: you have to die. Which brings to the forefront the whole concept of death itself. When you die, are you really dead? Maybe as rites of passage, you have to have “multiple” passings or deaths (through the afterlife trials and gates) in order to be more enlightened (more a spiritual being). This concept of rites and ordeals of passage in the underworld leads to the final component: (I think that bringing an embalmed body into the island sphere creates a magical spirit - - - Christian, for example; and shortly, Locke). At the end of the episode, Mrs. Hawking has the sociopath's smirk of serial killer.
We may not be seeing actual “time travel” as we perceive it. We are seeing immortal time being reconstructed from the entire wisdom and knowledge base of the world and all the lost souls. (Think, St. Peter at the gate of heaven or Thoth, the god of wisdom in the underworld, as knowing everything you did in your mortal life and storing that information for time of final judgment).
5. The conflict. If the island is the symbolic representation of the underworld, the relative conflict is who controls it. The hidden secrets, the ordeals, and the mind games (including the deals, with the devil so to speak) are elements to keep the lost souls on the island from figuring out what is really happening to them and the island. A good soldier just does what he is told to do. The island setting may be a microsphere of such a conflict: who controls a segment of sacred, therefore, powerful location in the realm of the afterlife.
We have a mix of good, bad and evil. We also have a mix of strong religious belief systems. Ancient Egyptian, Judea-Christian and Utopian (Dharma). We have an ancient culture of souls (Alpert), in battle with arrivals of Dharma souls and now the 815ers. Since the deceased brings with them their personality and knowledge, it would also bring their beliefs . . . including humanity’s never ending Holy Wars. However, a person’s beliefs do not necessary create wisdom: the reality of what is really happening to them. Only those who understand their plight (being dead) can grow in wisdom and transverse the perils through this dimension towards peace. I think that Rose is the only 815er who understood their situation from Day One.
After re-watching Lost to this point, the alleged “conflict” and pending “war” are overblown. If the island has the power over life and death (such as stopping Michael from committing suicide in NYC), then why does it need protection from one person like Widmore? Unless the conflict in personal or an internal mental conflict within one’s self, we have a faux filler story arc to complete the season.
And the time travel elements make less sense today than when they first aired in TV.
The idea that Walt’s dreams are creating waking events to the 815 characters is intriguing; it would also explain why Michael could not kill himself in NYC. Walt would not let him. But when Locke meets Walt after school, Walt knows what will happen to Locke, but he does not know what has happened to his father. Is Walt’s subconscious mind controlling the events?
In a dream state, anything is possible including time travel, smoke monsters, temples, evil people, ship wrecks, murder and violence. And in a dream state, there is no moral component of judgment. As the numerous bad acts that the characters will do in the series, none of them are “punished” for their sins. It may be that Walt is the dream maker in this whole story; once his father is out of his life, he mentally kills him off and continues the adventures of his island friends.
Monday, December 17, 2012
REBOOT EPISODES 85-88
POSTING NOTE: Due to work changes, I may not be able to post updates on Tuesdays after Monday night marathon G4 reruns, but updates will occur later in the week.
LOST REBOOT
Recap: Episodes 85-88 (Days 99 - - ????)
Now we begin the jumbled confusion of Lost’s time travel circus:
After the Season 4 finale, the Oceanic Six and those left on the Island are separated by both time and space. The three years apart were covered in various ways.
On-island time shifts from 1974-1977. Chronology of island events as experienced by time-jumping islanders, up to the sudden arrival of the Oceanic 6 in 1977. Depicted during the first part of Season 5.
Off island time shifts from 2005-2007. Chronology of events taking place off the island after the rescue of the Oceanic 6. Depicted variously in flash forwards, real-time events, and flashbacks.
The key events in this four episode arc:
Widmore’s soldiers continue to reign havoc on the island, until they are ambushed by the Others with the help of Sayid and Kate, who get a free copter ride off the island as a result. But in haste to get back to the freighter, Sawyer jumps out to save his friends. However, when Ben kills Keamy in the Orchid station for killing Alex, it activates a “dead man” detonation device on the freighter, which eventually blows up killing Michael and Jin. The copter tries to get back to the island, but Ben moves the frozen donkey wheel, making the island “disappear.” The copter crashes, Desmond is dead in the water until revived by Jack. Then Penny’s boat arrives to rescue the Oceanic 6. But as a result of the sky flashing and island moving; the island is “skipping” in time and Locke meets Alpert on two different years, one in which he knows what is happening and another when he does not. Off the island, Ben is trying to get all the 815 survivors, including dead Locke’s body, back to the island. He asks Eloise what would happen if he cannot get everyone back. She replies, “God help us all.”
Science:
Exotic materials were referenced as being part of the Orchid station chamber.
Exotic Materials can include plastics, superalloys, semiconductors, superconductors and ceramics.
Casimir Effect
The existence of a force between two polarizable atoms and between such an atom and a conducting plate in 1947, and, after a conversation with Niels Bohr who suggested it had something to do with zero-point energy, Casimir alone formulated the theory predicting a force between neutral conducting plates in 1948; the former is called the Casimir-Polder force while the latter is the Casimir effect in the narrow sense. When this field is instead studied using the QED Vacuum of quantum electrodynamics, it is seen that the plates do affect the virtual photons which constitute the field, and generate a net force —either an attraction or a repulsion depending on the specific arrangement of the two plates. Although the Casimir effect can be expressed in terms of virtual particles interacting with the objects, it is best described and more easily calculated in terms of the zero point energy of a quantized field in the intervening space between the objects.
Science theory, fiction application:
Exotic matter with negative energy density may be required to stabilize a wormhole. In quantum mechanics of the Casimir effect can be used to produce a locally mass-negative region of space-time, and suggested that negative effect could be used to stabilize a wormhole to allow faster than light travel.
In physics, a wormhole is a hypothetical topographical feature of spacetime that would be, fundamentally, a "shortcut" through spacetime. For a simple visual explanation of a wormhole, consider spacetime visualized as a two-dimensional (2D) surface. If this surface is folded along a third dimension, it allows one to picture a wormhole "bridge". This is merely a visualization displayed to convey an essentially unvisualisable structure existing in 4 or more dimensions. The parts of the wormhole could be higher-dimensional analogues for the parts of the curved 2D surface; for example, instead of mouths which are circular holes in a 2D plane, a real wormhole's mouths could be spheres in 3D space. A wormhole is, in theory, much like a tunnel with two ends each in separate points in spacetime.
Improbabilities:
The trigger mechanism on Keamy that detonates the ship explosives.
The idea of “cooling” the fuse/trigger aboard the ship. In the set up of the device, it is stated that if the battery is disconnected (no charge sent to the device) it would trigger a detonation, meaning that there is a redundant power source for the firing signal and the electric spark to detonate the C4. Cooling the battery makes no sense to stop the bomb from going off.
No one would have survived the C4 explosion. 500 grams of C4 can destroy a car; 500 pounds would have total destructive effect on the ship. When the chemical reaction begins, the C-4 decomposes to release a variety of gases (notably, nitrogen and carbon oxides). The gases initially expand at about 26,400 feet per second (8,050 meters per second), applying a huge amount of force to everything in the surrounding area. At this expansion rate, it is totally impossible to outrun the explosion like they do in dozens of action movies. To the observer, the explosion is nearly instantaneous -- one second, everything's normal, and the next it's totally destroyed.
Clues:
Hurley continues to interact with dead people in a physical manner. When Sayid breaks him out of the hospital, he leaves his chess game by saying “checkmate, Mr. Eko.” When Sayid is darted and Hurley is pulled over by the police, the cop who raps on his window is Anna Lucia, who yells at him to get his act together.
On numerous occasions, people ask Hurley if he is “crazy” because he is acting crazy.
Desmond wakes up three years after rescue from a dream of Daniel telling him to go to Oxford, but Desmond suddenly realizes “it was not a dream; it was a memory.”
Keamy tells Ben that Widmore will find him. Ben replies, "Not if I find him first." Despite Locke's best efforts to save him, Keamy dies. Locke tells Ben that he just killed everyone on the freighter, to which Ben coldly responds, "So?"
Discussion:
“ Life is a long lesson in humility. ”
— James M. Barrie
This is the most science-centric loop in the Lost series. In order to digest these meaty concepts without indigestion, let us slowly examine what was said and what is inconsistent with the show’s stated mythology.
In the video, Halliwax explains that The Orchid was designed to investigate 'unique properties' of the Island, it is these properties create a kind of Casimir Effect. He points to a white triangular door, calling it the vault. Halliwax explains that the vault was constructed adjacent to what they believe to be a pocket of negatively charged exotic matter. Halliwax then warns the viewer never to place any metal objects inside the vault. Halliwax then places a white rabbit inside the vault, closing the doors and stating that they will send it 100 milliseconds into the future.
From a science fiction standpoint, the theory of using negatively charged exotic matter to create a Casimir type effect means that the Frozen Donkey Wheel is in essence, a worm hole stabilizer. The video states that no non-organic materials, such as metal, should be placed in the vault. The vault was used to send bunnies milliseconds into the future. However, it was extremely dangerous for the time traveling bunny to interact with its real time self in the station.
When Ben blows a hole in the vault, all we see is a rocky tunnel down to the chamber. This begs the question: where are the exotic materials, the plates to which the island’s unique energy interacts to create a change in spacetime? Is the negative exotic material organics, such as humans? In the multiverse sideways realm, are positive exotic materials human souls?
The island’s EM energy creates the waves to make the Casimir effect to stabilize the wormhole between universes. the church’s “white light” energy waves must make a positive Casimir effect to stabilize the worm hole at the other end of the tunnel. The negative (evil) character traits and actions on the island are clearly balanced by the positive (good) character traits in the sideways world.
In physics, a Einstein-Rosen Bridge (or wormhole) is a hypothetical feature of spacetime theory that would be, fundamentally, a "shortcut" through space and time. A wormhole is, in theory, much like a tunnel with two ends each in separate points in spacetime. By crossing the event horizon of a Schwarzschild wormhole which bridges two different universes. the observer seeing light that has fallen into the black hole interior region from the other universe; however, this other universe is unreachable in the case of a Schwarzschild wormhole, as the bridge always collapses before the observer has time to cross it, and everything that has fallen through the event horizon of either universe is inevitably crushed in the singularity. A Schwarzschild wormhole is a bridge between areas of space that can be modeled as vacuum solutions to the Einstein Field Equations. Kip Thorne proposed that using "exotic matter" to hold open the throat of a Schwarzschild wormhole, one can create a transferable wormhole. This is called a Morris-Thorne Wormhole. By accelerating one end of a wormhole, it would allow the person entering it to travel to an exact location years in the past or future.
The Orchid must use a particle accelerator to open a wormhole that is used for time/space travel. This is the "frozen wheel" - particle accelerators need to be cooled to operate (they use superconducting magnets). As Ben turns the spokes of the embedded wheel, inside the rock the light changes and energy increases to a yellowish color to a flash of bright white light. (The white light that is the same as the final moment of The End, when Christian opens the church doors to “move on.”) The movement of the FDW creates the same failsafe Hatch denotation of Desmond’s; the island goes through a purple-white flash. But in this situation, there is a clear mechanical musical tone to the energy escaping the underground chamber.
Ben tells him that there is a price to pay to move the Island. The person that moves it must leave it and never return there. Locke is reluctant to let Ben leave but Ben offers a handshake, apologizing for all the misery he has inflicted on Locke. (This is the same statement told to Locke by Jacob after Locke falls 8 stories. Why does Ben say once someone “leaves” the island, they never can come back? That is not true as the O6, Locke and Ben return to the island later in the series. And it appears Ben has turned the wheel before, since he is familiar with Tunisia landing pad. At this point in the series, it is obvious that Ben has lied so much he is incapable of telling real truths. The Others and Ben have come to and from the island on the submarine in the past. When one turns the wheel, there is no literal or spiritual reason that they are forbidden from returning, they simply cannot, since they are sent to an unknown destination somewhere else on the planet, while the island is moved to another unknown point. The impact of this is that the person who turns the wheel can never know where the island is, since they move it but do not know where it moves in relation to them. There is nothing stopping Ben from getting to the island if he can manage to find it—the catch is that he cannot find it.
Meanwhile, Locke left the Orchid and heads to Richard and the Others, following Ben's instructions. At his arrival, all of the Others look surprised and Richard tells him "welcome home." The humility of Ben’s demise as the island leader must have made Locke feel like he was on top of the world.
The freighter explosion sequence which kills everyone on board (for now) was interrupted by another strange twist. After Michael yells at Jin to leave, he hears whispers After the whispers, Christian Shepard appears in the room containing the explosives, telling Michael, "You can go now...". The boat explodes, killing Michael and everyone else on board. From the helicopter, Sun cries out in desperation over the apparent loss of her husband.
Why does ghost Christian have to be on the boat? It is Christian that “allows” the explosion?
When did Christian get so much “power” over life and death of the characters? It makes the whole bomb explosion sequence surreal - - - that the dead are controlling the lives of the apparent living. It also puts into question “who” is really in charge - - - we are led to believe that the man behind the curtain is the mysterious Jacob, but in The End it is Christian who is the master of ceremonies at Eloise’s church.
The question is the Church - - - it is dark and foreboding with a basement pendulum to find the island with Eloise; but it is also light and cheerful in the End. But are there two churches? One with evil world and other with good world? Or is there just one “church” in the sideways world - - - that is the equivalent of the island in the real world. It is the nexus plates between both worlds. So when the O6 left the island, did they really “go back home” or did they go into an alternative reality (with all the medical legal errors and improbabilities)? The sideways purgatory limbo world had characters “living” alternative lives - - - basically good, calm and productive. It is when they “remember” the island time is when they realize the sideways world is fake (in the sense of being a repressed illusion). But that creates another issue: is the island an equal illusion?
When the island “disappeared” when Ben moved the FDW, there should have been a massive oceanic event. Displacement of the island would have created huge void; ocean rift like a sinkhole of 2.65 miles in depth. Such as displacement of land mass would have created a downward force vector, not little indentation on surface of water. A massive displacement of earth (volume) of a Pacific island, which are volcanic, arising from thousands of feet below to the ocean bed, would have created a massive suction as surrounding water would flood the void; a massive whirlpool event. But this was not depicted from the view of the helicopter. So from the visual evidence presented, several conclusions can be drawn: a) that the island is not real in the sense that it contains real volume of earth substances like soil and rock; b) that the island’s disappearance is an illusion (like a magician making an elephant disappear with mirrors) since the ocean’s surface did not dramatically shift with water displacement; c) the island did not disappear, but dove underwater like a submarine (USO); d) the island, as a construct, is not real in our normal view of reality (may be mental, or representative).
Magical/Supernatural/Elements:
The Frozen Donkey will which “moves” an island in time and in space.
Christian appears before Michael in the freighter. Christian then allows the C4 to explode, granting Michael's wish to die.
Last lines in episodes:
EP 85:
SUN: [Shrieking] Jin!
EP 86:
BEN: Jack... I said, all of you. We're gonna have to bring him, too.
[Jack, standing feet from Ben and facing him in the tiny mortuary, turns back and looks at the body in the coffin. Ben regards the body for a moment too. The well-dressed, peaceful-looking body in the coffin, the body of Jeremy Bentham, is the body of John Locke.]
EP 87:
DESMOND: Oxford.
EP 88:
MS. HAWKING: Then God help us all.
New Ideas/Tests of Theories:
If you can’t get lost souls back in their place on the Island, “God help us all?”
Is Christian the shepard who is supposed to herd these lost souls to
bridge mind and body back in one place so they can move on in the after life?
The Dharma science statements infer that the island is a bridge or “portal” between two universes. The island’s unique energy properties stabilizes a wormhole that connects space time and these two separate universes. The question is whether it is a bridge between earth and the afterlife, or more probable - - - between hell and heaven.
When Desmond “died” in the water after the helicopter crash, the island was in a state of time flux; and his mind may have crossed through the portal to the other universe, to a duplicate, parallel self. Now, complicating this assumption is that the other universe is the sideways world - - - one we will be told is where everyone is dead.
Under science fiction multiverse theory, for every action or decision in this world, it creates a parallel universe based upon alternative event choices. As a result, zillions of universes could be operating with the same “characters” but in different situations.
The frozen donkey wheel is the chamber where both Ben and Locke met their destiny moments of sacrificing part of themselves for the sake of a bigger purpose, protecting the Island by moving it in time and space. In a cold chamber is a wooden gear wheel is surrounded by Egyptian glyphs, translated to mean:
OPEN SIDE (EARTH) GATES TO ETERNITIES.
This has to be the best evidence of what the Island is: a nexus point between worlds. Since the Island has been built up by deference to ancient Egyptian beliefs, the phrase can easily be broken down to state that is device allows one to open an earth portal (a gate) to the afterlife. The pyramids and Sphinx were designed as part of Temples to make sure that rulers and leaders would be able to make their dangerous journey through the afterlife to paradise. The Temples were aligned with cosmic and heavenly objects and stars to make sure that the journey would match the myth of Ra's nightly cycle through the underworld.
In ancient Egyptian culture, departed souls would reach a pagan paradise where they would toil in the fields of the gods, while others would go into the underworld to have their heart weighed in the final judgment on whether they would pass onto eternal paradise. The Island could the the intersection of different, supernatural realms of good and evil. This could explain why our perception natural laws and physics seem not to apply to aspects of Island as a reason why there is no scientific or scientific theory explanation for the supernatural elements in the show. The Island is a different realm, a bridge between Earth (and its laws of physics) and a spirit world (where anything goes). Or better yet, the island is the Temple of the Dead who seek a bridge to the living after life (the sideways world).
If you fix the heart, you fix the mind. In island world, especially off-island, it is dark. Evil is center in the characters hearts. Quick to anger; quick to murder. But if one fixes the troubles in their heart, it heals their mental issues.
When we try to find a constant in the series, what are the most repeated lines by the characters?
“I’m sorry.”
“Are you crazy?”
“I am not crazy!”
“Trust me.”
What are the characters attributes in The End? Did any of them really change personality, beliefs? Did any really find redemption, forgiveness of past sins, or have any punishment for their evil ways? No, not really. The sideways church was not the judgment of the on-island events. In fact, there is no moral to the story of The End.
As such, can the series be better viewed as the bridge between lost souls on a journey of personal grief in the afterlife to find some relief with new souls in the next step towards heaven? One is a place of hell and the other a place of happiness.
LOST REBOOT
Recap: Episodes 85-88 (Days 99 - - ????)
Now we begin the jumbled confusion of Lost’s time travel circus:
After the Season 4 finale, the Oceanic Six and those left on the Island are separated by both time and space. The three years apart were covered in various ways.
On-island time shifts from 1974-1977. Chronology of island events as experienced by time-jumping islanders, up to the sudden arrival of the Oceanic 6 in 1977. Depicted during the first part of Season 5.
Off island time shifts from 2005-2007. Chronology of events taking place off the island after the rescue of the Oceanic 6. Depicted variously in flash forwards, real-time events, and flashbacks.
The key events in this four episode arc:
Widmore’s soldiers continue to reign havoc on the island, until they are ambushed by the Others with the help of Sayid and Kate, who get a free copter ride off the island as a result. But in haste to get back to the freighter, Sawyer jumps out to save his friends. However, when Ben kills Keamy in the Orchid station for killing Alex, it activates a “dead man” detonation device on the freighter, which eventually blows up killing Michael and Jin. The copter tries to get back to the island, but Ben moves the frozen donkey wheel, making the island “disappear.” The copter crashes, Desmond is dead in the water until revived by Jack. Then Penny’s boat arrives to rescue the Oceanic 6. But as a result of the sky flashing and island moving; the island is “skipping” in time and Locke meets Alpert on two different years, one in which he knows what is happening and another when he does not. Off the island, Ben is trying to get all the 815 survivors, including dead Locke’s body, back to the island. He asks Eloise what would happen if he cannot get everyone back. She replies, “God help us all.”
Science:
Exotic materials were referenced as being part of the Orchid station chamber.
Exotic Materials can include plastics, superalloys, semiconductors, superconductors and ceramics.
Casimir Effect
The existence of a force between two polarizable atoms and between such an atom and a conducting plate in 1947, and, after a conversation with Niels Bohr who suggested it had something to do with zero-point energy, Casimir alone formulated the theory predicting a force between neutral conducting plates in 1948; the former is called the Casimir-Polder force while the latter is the Casimir effect in the narrow sense. When this field is instead studied using the QED Vacuum of quantum electrodynamics, it is seen that the plates do affect the virtual photons which constitute the field, and generate a net force —either an attraction or a repulsion depending on the specific arrangement of the two plates. Although the Casimir effect can be expressed in terms of virtual particles interacting with the objects, it is best described and more easily calculated in terms of the zero point energy of a quantized field in the intervening space between the objects.
Science theory, fiction application:
Exotic matter with negative energy density may be required to stabilize a wormhole. In quantum mechanics of the Casimir effect can be used to produce a locally mass-negative region of space-time, and suggested that negative effect could be used to stabilize a wormhole to allow faster than light travel.
In physics, a wormhole is a hypothetical topographical feature of spacetime that would be, fundamentally, a "shortcut" through spacetime. For a simple visual explanation of a wormhole, consider spacetime visualized as a two-dimensional (2D) surface. If this surface is folded along a third dimension, it allows one to picture a wormhole "bridge". This is merely a visualization displayed to convey an essentially unvisualisable structure existing in 4 or more dimensions. The parts of the wormhole could be higher-dimensional analogues for the parts of the curved 2D surface; for example, instead of mouths which are circular holes in a 2D plane, a real wormhole's mouths could be spheres in 3D space. A wormhole is, in theory, much like a tunnel with two ends each in separate points in spacetime.
Improbabilities:
The trigger mechanism on Keamy that detonates the ship explosives.
The idea of “cooling” the fuse/trigger aboard the ship. In the set up of the device, it is stated that if the battery is disconnected (no charge sent to the device) it would trigger a detonation, meaning that there is a redundant power source for the firing signal and the electric spark to detonate the C4. Cooling the battery makes no sense to stop the bomb from going off.
No one would have survived the C4 explosion. 500 grams of C4 can destroy a car; 500 pounds would have total destructive effect on the ship. When the chemical reaction begins, the C-4 decomposes to release a variety of gases (notably, nitrogen and carbon oxides). The gases initially expand at about 26,400 feet per second (8,050 meters per second), applying a huge amount of force to everything in the surrounding area. At this expansion rate, it is totally impossible to outrun the explosion like they do in dozens of action movies. To the observer, the explosion is nearly instantaneous -- one second, everything's normal, and the next it's totally destroyed.
Clues:
Hurley continues to interact with dead people in a physical manner. When Sayid breaks him out of the hospital, he leaves his chess game by saying “checkmate, Mr. Eko.” When Sayid is darted and Hurley is pulled over by the police, the cop who raps on his window is Anna Lucia, who yells at him to get his act together.
On numerous occasions, people ask Hurley if he is “crazy” because he is acting crazy.
Desmond wakes up three years after rescue from a dream of Daniel telling him to go to Oxford, but Desmond suddenly realizes “it was not a dream; it was a memory.”
Keamy tells Ben that Widmore will find him. Ben replies, "Not if I find him first." Despite Locke's best efforts to save him, Keamy dies. Locke tells Ben that he just killed everyone on the freighter, to which Ben coldly responds, "So?"
Discussion:
“ Life is a long lesson in humility. ”
— James M. Barrie
This is the most science-centric loop in the Lost series. In order to digest these meaty concepts without indigestion, let us slowly examine what was said and what is inconsistent with the show’s stated mythology.
In the video, Halliwax explains that The Orchid was designed to investigate 'unique properties' of the Island, it is these properties create a kind of Casimir Effect. He points to a white triangular door, calling it the vault. Halliwax explains that the vault was constructed adjacent to what they believe to be a pocket of negatively charged exotic matter. Halliwax then warns the viewer never to place any metal objects inside the vault. Halliwax then places a white rabbit inside the vault, closing the doors and stating that they will send it 100 milliseconds into the future.
From a science fiction standpoint, the theory of using negatively charged exotic matter to create a Casimir type effect means that the Frozen Donkey Wheel is in essence, a worm hole stabilizer. The video states that no non-organic materials, such as metal, should be placed in the vault. The vault was used to send bunnies milliseconds into the future. However, it was extremely dangerous for the time traveling bunny to interact with its real time self in the station.
When Ben blows a hole in the vault, all we see is a rocky tunnel down to the chamber. This begs the question: where are the exotic materials, the plates to which the island’s unique energy interacts to create a change in spacetime? Is the negative exotic material organics, such as humans? In the multiverse sideways realm, are positive exotic materials human souls?
The island’s EM energy creates the waves to make the Casimir effect to stabilize the wormhole between universes. the church’s “white light” energy waves must make a positive Casimir effect to stabilize the worm hole at the other end of the tunnel. The negative (evil) character traits and actions on the island are clearly balanced by the positive (good) character traits in the sideways world.
In physics, a Einstein-Rosen Bridge (or wormhole) is a hypothetical feature of spacetime theory that would be, fundamentally, a "shortcut" through space and time. A wormhole is, in theory, much like a tunnel with two ends each in separate points in spacetime. By crossing the event horizon of a Schwarzschild wormhole which bridges two different universes. the observer seeing light that has fallen into the black hole interior region from the other universe; however, this other universe is unreachable in the case of a Schwarzschild wormhole, as the bridge always collapses before the observer has time to cross it, and everything that has fallen through the event horizon of either universe is inevitably crushed in the singularity. A Schwarzschild wormhole is a bridge between areas of space that can be modeled as vacuum solutions to the Einstein Field Equations. Kip Thorne proposed that using "exotic matter" to hold open the throat of a Schwarzschild wormhole, one can create a transferable wormhole. This is called a Morris-Thorne Wormhole. By accelerating one end of a wormhole, it would allow the person entering it to travel to an exact location years in the past or future.
The Orchid must use a particle accelerator to open a wormhole that is used for time/space travel. This is the "frozen wheel" - particle accelerators need to be cooled to operate (they use superconducting magnets). As Ben turns the spokes of the embedded wheel, inside the rock the light changes and energy increases to a yellowish color to a flash of bright white light. (The white light that is the same as the final moment of The End, when Christian opens the church doors to “move on.”) The movement of the FDW creates the same failsafe Hatch denotation of Desmond’s; the island goes through a purple-white flash. But in this situation, there is a clear mechanical musical tone to the energy escaping the underground chamber.
Ben tells him that there is a price to pay to move the Island. The person that moves it must leave it and never return there. Locke is reluctant to let Ben leave but Ben offers a handshake, apologizing for all the misery he has inflicted on Locke. (This is the same statement told to Locke by Jacob after Locke falls 8 stories. Why does Ben say once someone “leaves” the island, they never can come back? That is not true as the O6, Locke and Ben return to the island later in the series. And it appears Ben has turned the wheel before, since he is familiar with Tunisia landing pad. At this point in the series, it is obvious that Ben has lied so much he is incapable of telling real truths. The Others and Ben have come to and from the island on the submarine in the past. When one turns the wheel, there is no literal or spiritual reason that they are forbidden from returning, they simply cannot, since they are sent to an unknown destination somewhere else on the planet, while the island is moved to another unknown point. The impact of this is that the person who turns the wheel can never know where the island is, since they move it but do not know where it moves in relation to them. There is nothing stopping Ben from getting to the island if he can manage to find it—the catch is that he cannot find it.
Meanwhile, Locke left the Orchid and heads to Richard and the Others, following Ben's instructions. At his arrival, all of the Others look surprised and Richard tells him "welcome home." The humility of Ben’s demise as the island leader must have made Locke feel like he was on top of the world.
The freighter explosion sequence which kills everyone on board (for now) was interrupted by another strange twist. After Michael yells at Jin to leave, he hears whispers After the whispers, Christian Shepard appears in the room containing the explosives, telling Michael, "You can go now...". The boat explodes, killing Michael and everyone else on board. From the helicopter, Sun cries out in desperation over the apparent loss of her husband.
Why does ghost Christian have to be on the boat? It is Christian that “allows” the explosion?
When did Christian get so much “power” over life and death of the characters? It makes the whole bomb explosion sequence surreal - - - that the dead are controlling the lives of the apparent living. It also puts into question “who” is really in charge - - - we are led to believe that the man behind the curtain is the mysterious Jacob, but in The End it is Christian who is the master of ceremonies at Eloise’s church.
The question is the Church - - - it is dark and foreboding with a basement pendulum to find the island with Eloise; but it is also light and cheerful in the End. But are there two churches? One with evil world and other with good world? Or is there just one “church” in the sideways world - - - that is the equivalent of the island in the real world. It is the nexus plates between both worlds. So when the O6 left the island, did they really “go back home” or did they go into an alternative reality (with all the medical legal errors and improbabilities)? The sideways purgatory limbo world had characters “living” alternative lives - - - basically good, calm and productive. It is when they “remember” the island time is when they realize the sideways world is fake (in the sense of being a repressed illusion). But that creates another issue: is the island an equal illusion?
When the island “disappeared” when Ben moved the FDW, there should have been a massive oceanic event. Displacement of the island would have created huge void; ocean rift like a sinkhole of 2.65 miles in depth. Such as displacement of land mass would have created a downward force vector, not little indentation on surface of water. A massive displacement of earth (volume) of a Pacific island, which are volcanic, arising from thousands of feet below to the ocean bed, would have created a massive suction as surrounding water would flood the void; a massive whirlpool event. But this was not depicted from the view of the helicopter. So from the visual evidence presented, several conclusions can be drawn: a) that the island is not real in the sense that it contains real volume of earth substances like soil and rock; b) that the island’s disappearance is an illusion (like a magician making an elephant disappear with mirrors) since the ocean’s surface did not dramatically shift with water displacement; c) the island did not disappear, but dove underwater like a submarine (USO); d) the island, as a construct, is not real in our normal view of reality (may be mental, or representative).
Magical/Supernatural/Elements:
The Frozen Donkey will which “moves” an island in time and in space.
Christian appears before Michael in the freighter. Christian then allows the C4 to explode, granting Michael's wish to die.
Last lines in episodes:
EP 85:
SUN: [Shrieking] Jin!
EP 86:
BEN: Jack... I said, all of you. We're gonna have to bring him, too.
[Jack, standing feet from Ben and facing him in the tiny mortuary, turns back and looks at the body in the coffin. Ben regards the body for a moment too. The well-dressed, peaceful-looking body in the coffin, the body of Jeremy Bentham, is the body of John Locke.]
EP 87:
DESMOND: Oxford.
EP 88:
MS. HAWKING: Then God help us all.
New Ideas/Tests of Theories:
If you can’t get lost souls back in their place on the Island, “God help us all?”
Is Christian the shepard who is supposed to herd these lost souls to
bridge mind and body back in one place so they can move on in the after life?
The Dharma science statements infer that the island is a bridge or “portal” between two universes. The island’s unique energy properties stabilizes a wormhole that connects space time and these two separate universes. The question is whether it is a bridge between earth and the afterlife, or more probable - - - between hell and heaven.
When Desmond “died” in the water after the helicopter crash, the island was in a state of time flux; and his mind may have crossed through the portal to the other universe, to a duplicate, parallel self. Now, complicating this assumption is that the other universe is the sideways world - - - one we will be told is where everyone is dead.
Under science fiction multiverse theory, for every action or decision in this world, it creates a parallel universe based upon alternative event choices. As a result, zillions of universes could be operating with the same “characters” but in different situations.
The frozen donkey wheel is the chamber where both Ben and Locke met their destiny moments of sacrificing part of themselves for the sake of a bigger purpose, protecting the Island by moving it in time and space. In a cold chamber is a wooden gear wheel is surrounded by Egyptian glyphs, translated to mean:
OPEN SIDE (EARTH) GATES TO ETERNITIES.
This has to be the best evidence of what the Island is: a nexus point between worlds. Since the Island has been built up by deference to ancient Egyptian beliefs, the phrase can easily be broken down to state that is device allows one to open an earth portal (a gate) to the afterlife. The pyramids and Sphinx were designed as part of Temples to make sure that rulers and leaders would be able to make their dangerous journey through the afterlife to paradise. The Temples were aligned with cosmic and heavenly objects and stars to make sure that the journey would match the myth of Ra's nightly cycle through the underworld.
In ancient Egyptian culture, departed souls would reach a pagan paradise where they would toil in the fields of the gods, while others would go into the underworld to have their heart weighed in the final judgment on whether they would pass onto eternal paradise. The Island could the the intersection of different, supernatural realms of good and evil. This could explain why our perception natural laws and physics seem not to apply to aspects of Island as a reason why there is no scientific or scientific theory explanation for the supernatural elements in the show. The Island is a different realm, a bridge between Earth (and its laws of physics) and a spirit world (where anything goes). Or better yet, the island is the Temple of the Dead who seek a bridge to the living after life (the sideways world).
If you fix the heart, you fix the mind. In island world, especially off-island, it is dark. Evil is center in the characters hearts. Quick to anger; quick to murder. But if one fixes the troubles in their heart, it heals their mental issues.
When we try to find a constant in the series, what are the most repeated lines by the characters?
“I’m sorry.”
“Are you crazy?”
“I am not crazy!”
“Trust me.”
What are the characters attributes in The End? Did any of them really change personality, beliefs? Did any really find redemption, forgiveness of past sins, or have any punishment for their evil ways? No, not really. The sideways church was not the judgment of the on-island events. In fact, there is no moral to the story of The End.
As such, can the series be better viewed as the bridge between lost souls on a journey of personal grief in the afterlife to find some relief with new souls in the next step towards heaven? One is a place of hell and the other a place of happiness.
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
REBOOT EPISODES 81-84
POSTING NOTE: Due to work changes, I may not be able to post updates on Tuesdays after Monday night marathon G4 reruns, but updates will occur later in the week.
LOST REBOOT
Recap: Episodes 81-84 (Days 97-100)
Locke’s camp at the Barracks comes under attack. At least three Locke campers die. Claire is blown up by a rocket exploding her cabin to rubble. Ben miscalculates his plan with the Keamy, who summarily executes Alex. As a result, Ben summons the smoke monster to attack the soldiers as a means of escaping the barracks compound. Dr. Ray’s body, throat slit, washes up on the beach. Jack is finally told the truth about the murderous intentions of the Keamy’s soldiers.
Juliet tells Kate that her kiss was Jack was nothing because he loves someone else after she and Bernard save Jack from his appendicitis, a condition that Rose cannot understand since the Island is a place of healing. Claire wanders off into the jungle after seeing Christian holding Aaron by the camp fire. Sawyer must take the baby back to the beach. In the flash forwards, Jack's relationship with Kate and his mental health begin to deteriorate as he is given a prophetic message from Hurley and sees visions of his dead father at the hospital, after a smoke alarm goes off.
Locke has a “dream” of Horace chopping down trees. He uses that information to find cabin by finding a “magic” map as Hurley calls it in the pocket of dead Horace. Ben laments that “I used to dream.” Pilot Frank balks at going back to the island, knowing that the soldiers will kill everyone there. But after the captain and Dr. Ray are killed, Frank relents but hides a sat phone to drop on the beach camp. Jack believes the phone is a sign from Sayid to follow the copter, but when Sayid arrives with a boat, the camp learns it is the exact opposite. When Kate arrives back at the beach with Miles, she gives Sun Aaron to go off with Sayid to rescue Jack’s party.
Daniel takes six survivors to the Kahana, including Jin, Sun and Aaron, That leaves six people on the beach, including Charlotte, Miles, Rose and Bernard. Jack and Sawyer head toward the copter as Locke, Ben and Hurley go to the greenhouse station, the Orchid, in order to “move the island.” Ben calls it the last resort, a dangerous and perilous act. But the soldiers are already at the station, so Ben gives himself up (with giving Locke no real explanation on how to move the island). Kate and Sayid are captured by Alpert and the Others. In the future, the “Oceanic Six” return to their families on the Mainland after their rescue in Indonesia.
Science:
The concept of space time.
Starting from Issac Newton to Max Plank a definite relationship is supposed to exist between time and space. However it was Einstein who integrated the two in his theory of Relativity and Special theory of Relativity. As per Einstein time and space could be plotted on a graph and theoretically could be traversed in any direction.
Einstein advocated a 4 dimensional universe. This was a revolutionary concept as all along from the Greek philosophers the concept of time and space was 3 dimensional. Einstein added a fourth coordinate time. Einstein also put a limitation to the speed that could be achieved in any medium and that was the speed of light, which was constant in all mediums.
Modern theory of space and time is greatly derived from the concepts of Einstein and to a certain extant Max Plank. Modern thought points to the fact that though time has a direction but there is no practical time reversal. Though theoretically you could see a movie from the beginning or start seeing from the end, yet in real terms the direction of time is one way. Theoretically anything that can happen moving forward through time is just as possible moving backwards in time. Or, put in another way, through the eyes of physics, there will be no distinction, in terms of possibility, between what happens in a movie if the film is run forward, or if the film is run backwards. However our experience of time, at almost all levels shows that time-reversal is not possible. An object may break and fall to pieces on the ground, but the reverse does not happen as the pieces do not fly back and become one again.
Schizophrenia
Not getting enough sleep could be linked with triggering symptoms among people with schizophrenia, suggests a new animal study published in the Neuron journal.
People with schizophrenia frequently experience sleep problems. To find the exact effect disrupted sleep has on the brain with schizophrenia, researchers from the University of Bristol and the Lilly Centre for Cognitive Neuroscience examined brain wave activity of sleeping rats that were engineered to have schizophrenia.
They found that during non-rapid eye movement sleep (NREM sleep, which precedes REM sleep), waves of brain activity normally ripple between the hippocampus and frontal cortex regions of the brain, which play parts in the formation of memories and in decision-making, respectively.
However, when the rats' NREM sleep was fragmented, they found that this brain wave activity was not synchronized.
This is certainly not the first time sleep and schizophrenia have been linked. In 2010, a study in the journal Nature Reviews Neuroscience showed that circadian rhythm disruptions are often experienced by people with psychiatric conditions.
And LiveScience reported on a British Journal of Psychiatry study showing that people who have schizophrenia are also troubled by more sleep problems than people without the condition, which is marked by symptoms of hallucinations, social withdrawal, and memory and attention problems.
"We've been thinking of sleep disruption as one of the genetic, developmental and environmental contributors to the development of these appalling conditions," the researcher of that study, Russell Foster, of the University of Oxford, told LiveScience.
Improbabilities:
Dr. Ray’s dead body floating to the beach faster than a helicopter traveling at speed to the island.
Dr. Ray being alive on the boat on Day 99 but his dead body washed ashore on Day 96.
Ray's body washes up on shore before he is killed because the island is always moving through time (forward and back) and so the time on the island is not the same time as a boat far enough offshore.
Clues:
Jack asks another doctor in the hospital lobby for an instant prescription for sleeping pills due to the stress of his new engagement and work load.
When Locke goes to Jacob’s cabin, and it is Christian present instead, who says he can speak for Jacob, Locke asks what he can do “to save the island.” Christian apparently tells him to “move the island.” But these may be metaphors if you exchange “Jack” for the “island.”
Hurley tells Jack that they are “all dead.” That they never left the island.
Christian tells Locke not to tell anyone that Claire “is with him,” which is a reference to Jack that Claire is dead.
When the smoke alarm goes off in the hospital lobby, Jack finds his ghost father. The connection may be that Christian is a smoke monster, who has the ability to get off the island (Jacob).
When Locke lights the lantern to go into the cabin, it is like a lamp in a genie tale: genies grant wishes much like the island.
When Locke sees Horace skipping and cutting down the same tree over and over again, one believes that it is his dream; or that it could be a skipping or misfunctioning record/hologram program.
Horace tells Locke that he has been dead for 12 years. To find “his cabin,” he has to find him which infers that Jacob was Horace at some point in time.
When Ben confronts Widmore in London in his flash forward, Widmore admits that he drinks because of his nightmares. Ben also asks him why “he changed the rules” and killed his daughter. Widmore rebuffs and says he did no such thing; Ben killed her by his own actions. But Ben then says he will kill Widmore’s daughter, Penny. Widmore scoffs, you can never find her. As a result, both men are “hunting” something: an island and Penny. In reality, Ben could have killed Widmore, but apparently that is against their “rules.” The only one who has that rule is Jacob and MIB.
Hurley says while playing Risk, that “Australia is the key to the game.”
Jack reads to Aaron “.... if I am not the same from this morning - - - that’s the great puzzle.” He later says his father “was a good story teller.”
It Abaddon (the devil?) who tells rehabbing Locke that Locke needs to go on his walkabout in the outback. The Australian country is the symbol of forehell, the beginning of the after life journey for all the lost souls on Flight 815.
Sawyer follows a post-op Jack, who is going after the copter, with the line, “you don’t get to die alone.”
Young Locke “failing” Alpert’s test of what objects “already belong to him.” It flashes back to other stories where priests go to young persons with objects to determine if they are the reincarnated leader, king or god.
Discussion:
“Everything I did in my life that was worthwhile I caught hell for.”
---- Earl Warren
A place where dreams can come true is also a place where nightmares and their fears can also come true. Is the direction of Lost taking us into the various conflicts in Jack’s own mind, as referenced in the flash forward mental deterioration of the leader of the 815 survivors? That theory is more fully developed below.
We do see the fringes coming off Jack’s mental cape. He is slowly beating himself down with mission after mission, decision after decision; the promises are eating away at his soul and he cannot “fix” the situation which is quickly flashing out of control with a mercenary army coming to the island to kill everyone. It is something that Jack himself cannot control, so his mental faculties appear to go haywire.
Another long portion of this arc is the emergence of Locke as the “chosen” one to save the island. If the island is not symbolic for Jack, then the story of Locke is one of injured fish being tossed downstream through the rapids.
We are told that Jacob is the one everyone reports to on the island. And Jacob the name means “following after, supplanter.” It means Jacob “replaced” someone or something. Ben believed that he would one day replace Jacob as the guardian of the island - - - but he was arrogantly wrong. Locke now believes that his destiny is to protect the island, but he also is arrogantly wrong. In the show’s conclusion, we find no true resolution of succession of Jacob because we do not know what kind of “being” he was and what the island “truly represents.” Even if Jacob was a guardian angel guarding the gates of hell (the island), the deaths of the 815 cast would not change his role because in the end, “there are no rules.” If it is a game like backgammon, it was tossed over before it was finished like Locke’s foster sister when Alpert showed up when Locke was a young boy.
Locke’s test could have been the critical evidence of why Locke is “special.” Alpert was present at the hospital after Locke was “miraculously” born after his mother (who was not showing her pregnancy after 6 months) was struck by a car (driven by Cooper). We know that Alpert is immortal messenger of Jacob. Why or how he would know of Locke’s circumstance means that the island has been watching Locke from the beginning. Or if Locke was never born, his soul has been moved along by after life messengers such as Abaddon or Alpert.
Alpert’s test of Locke was interesting (and controversial to fans). The objects presented to Locke were:
A brass compass, which he would receive on the island in the future.
A baseball glove, which could have been Dogan’s from the Temple.
An old book, “The Book of Laws,” a reference Eko made to the Old Testament.
A vial of sand, which is symbolic of the island.
A comic book, Mystery Tales No. 40, with the subtitle “What was the secret of the mysterious HIDDEN LAND!”
A wood handled knife, which is different than the knife collection he brought to his walkabout.
The Comic book lead to a load of fan research. The short stories contained in the issue seemed to brim with island story lines:
"The Hidden Land!" (four pages)
"A Warning Voice!" (four pages)
"The Travelers" (two pages)
"Crossroads of Destiny!" (four pages) — features Roman emperor Julius Caesar (100–44 BC) and Italian navigator Christopher Columbus (1451–1506)
"Sammy's Secret!" (three pages)
"The Silent Stranger" (four pages)
"March Has 32 Days" (four pages), a story about a man who has a chance to re-live a day and change his fate.
The comic may set forth the various themes of the show, but does not clearly indicate that it is the source material for the show.
It would appear that Locke failed the test because he picked the knife. The knife was something he brought to the island; a weapon. The vial of sand as the island was his first choice; and the compass his second. That makes sense for the island would be Jacob’s, and the compass would for direction, or leadership of the island.
It would seem that Alpert was looking for Locke to pick one more item - - - which we would assume would be the old book, as the “rules” of the island are coming into play more and more (as seen in the Ben-Widmore dynamic.)
But Locke failed the first test. In high school, his counselor advised him that a Portland firm was looking for Locke to join them in special research projects. But Locke refused to be a man of science. So he failed the second test. On the island, he failed a third test when he refused to kill his father to show “his commitment” to the Others and the island. But then, he “cheated” his way into the Others camp by having Sawyer kill Cooper. But in the end, Locke failed his final test because he died off the island - - - and his body’s return was used by MIB to wreck havoc on everyone on the island (much like Widmore’s men tried to do.)
It seems that when leaders take it upon themselves to make the final life and death decisions for the betterment of their group, they die physically or emotionally. It is a test that most leaders fail.
One of the main criticisms of Lost was how it created multiple “time” issues without explaining the rational of each, or how the conflicting concepts could be rationalized into a workable science fiction narrative. We have Desmond’s mental “time flashes” to where he literally re-lives portions of his life, and changes the consequences of his past actions. We have Eloise’s commentary that no matter what happens, the universe “course corrects” any time-event changes. We have a physical distortion of the linear time line when Dr. Ray’s dead body floats ashore three days before he is killed. We have time space issues with the island “moving” in the physical world, but depositing people in different times (including Ben months before turning the frozen donkey wheel) to several 815ers zipping back to Dharma, 1977. Then you have the concurrent overlapping of two different time periods on the same island. The only unsatisfying explanation for all these conflicting time elements is that none of them are truly real.
The events, however real they seem, are figments of someone’s imagination. The open question is who’s imagination?
Magical/Supernatural/Elements:
The concept of “moving” a Pacific island.
The fact that Doctor Ray shows up dead on the island beach BEFORE he leaves the freighter (communication).
Last lines in episodes:
EP 81:
BEN: I suppose it is. Sleep tight, Charles.
[Ben leaves, pulling the door shut behind him.]
EP 82:
SAWYER: CLAIRE! CLAIRE!!!
EP 83:
LOCKE: He wants us to move the island.
EP 84:
BEN: My name is Benjamin Linus. I believe you're looking for me.
[Keamy points his gun at Ben's head for a moment before striking him with it.]
New Ideas/Tests of Theories:
“It is all about Jack.”
When at the mental hospital, Hurley tells Jack that they never left the island. Jack thinks he is crazy. But if the references of the island, and the snow globe effect are not real, but the symbolic representation of Jack’s own brain, then Hurley may have a pointed to the ultimate truth.
Many fans believe the series focus was solely around Jack. It was Jack who sacrificed himself in The End so his remaining friends could get off the island. It was all his island friends who were waiting for him in the church at The End. The most intense flash backs and flash forwards are Jack-centric episodes. So there is a lot of evidence that Jack was the keystone to the Lost mythology (even though initially Jack’s character was going to be killed in the first season, for dramatic effect.).
Was Jack not listening to his “inner voice?” Even in cartoons, a character in conflict sometimes has his conscious or inner voice pop up to give him advice, or tell him what to do. It is sometimes shown as good versus evil giving opposite guidance.
It is also an observation that while the island has an inherit “healing” property, during the course of the show, Jack’s physical and mental conditions deteriorate. It begins with the stress of being the defacto leader of the survivors, and grows to sleepless burden of the weight of his world upon his shoulders to make life and death decisions, to the inconsistent to irrational mental decisions, including objective threats of killing people who crossed him.
The lack of sleep, addiction to pain medications, haunted memories and questionable decision making are all symptoms of a sleep depressed person with schizophrenia.
We have discussed various theories, including mental instability and subconscious dream states, as explanations for the various inconsistent and improbable island story arcs. One theory that could tie many of these other theories together would be through Jack.
Jack has been considered the pillar of strength during the series. But what if he was really a pillar of salt? If all the story lines intersect through Jack’s consciousness, then what or who are these strangers in his island world?
The characters surrounding Jack could represent his inner emotional states. Hurley could be symbolic of his conflict with gluttony such as addictions. Kate could be symbolic of his conflict with women, relationships such as irrational jealousy. Sawyer could be symbolic of his conflict with bullies, such as his school yard fights. Locke could be symbolic of his conflict with authority figures, such as a father figure he would not listen to in his actions.
As the series will grind on, Jack will tell himself more and more that “he should have listened to Locke.” As a person who thought he could save anyone, Jack could never listen to others to save himself. Or so the theory would go. Locke, as a paralysis victim of an 8 story fall, is not seen in Jack’s world (the island) as a wheelchair bound disabled person because Jack can fix anything or anyone. Jack is a miracle worker; “miracles” happen on his watch.
But even miracles have their back story limits. The miracle births of Locke and Ben made them “special” in the eyes of the island watchers. The miracle transformation of paralyzed man into outback hunter to the Others made Locke again “special.” The ability to do complex back surgery on Ben without modern technology or specialist help was Jack “working” another miracle. But for each miracle, Jack seems to get punished. By whom? Himself.
Jack, as a doctor or as a son of a doctor, would have had contact with many medical patients, unique histories and personality traits to have a expansive knowledge of human behavior and frail human emotional disorders. He said Christian “was a good story teller.” He may have inherited the ability to fantasize a unique, bizarre world which somehow came unglued or out of control with his own schizophrenia.
Jack wears down in the series because he is always “running” including his mind when he tries to sleep. Experts debate the basic proposition of why people need to go to sleep. It is believed that rest revitalizes the body, restores energy and heals body systems. It is also considered that when one sleeps, the brain is limiting its functions so
the body had repair neurotransmitters in the brain. It may also be that the brain “de-fragments” the waking observations, thoughts and materials into memories to be accessed in the future by the waking mind.
Scientists also do not understand why humans dream when they sleep. There appears to be no biologic function. Some believe that dreams are merely an unintended consequence of the brain repairing itself while at rest; reshuffling the memory files triggers some secondary active visions. Other scientists believe that dreams are a primal way of humans to “test” activities and events in order to be better prepared for the real, waking world. In primitive societies, the basic fears of being attacked by predators is a tenet of nightmares. But if one dreams of situations where one could fend
off such attacks, the waking person would be better prepared when it actually happens.
So what if the basic brain repair function goes haywire? You have a person in acute distress over time. The brain does not function normally; it cannot focus clearly because memories and reality begin to jumble, intersect, collide. If a person has a deep fantasy gene, or multiple personalities, that person’s mind could run wild. Escaping reality into one’s own subconscious fantasy could be the reason why so many show elements are connected through Jack.
For example, the numbers are not Hurley’s or Leonard’s curse. The numbers were “on the island” before they knew about them. The numbers supersede their knowledge or meaning because it already exists in “the island world.” If the island world is Jack’s own mind, as a formula representation of how to save his world (personal Valenzetti equation).
Lost theories have transposed the numbers in latent character personalities that they seem to represent in the story,
Locke (4) is seen as faith, hope or
Hurley (8) is seen a compassion or good will
Sawyer (15) is seen as change or personal growth
Sayid (16) is seen as common sense or order
Jack (23) is seen as rational self
Jin (42) is seen as family or love.
Alternative “human” factors for each character was thought to be
Locke (4) as intuition
Hurley (8) as perception
Sawyer (15) as feeling
Sayid (16) as judgment
Jack (23) as thinking
Jin (42) as sensation.
But if one puts all these characters into Jack’s own mind, we get a better clue.
Locke (4) is something broken that needs to be fixed
Hurley (8) is seen as a cursed addiction to be remedied
Sawyer (15) is an angry kid who can’t be responsible and grow up
Sayid (16) is smart individual who succumbs to rages of madness
Jack (23) is seen as his conflicted self
Jin (42) is the representation of the foreign and unknown aspects of the world.
If you add other major characters:
Kate is the embodiment of jealousy in relationships
Juliet is the tension between professional and unprofessional behavior.
Rose and Bernard as representation of soul mates
Boone as the naive follower.
Shannon as the spoiled child.
Libby is the calming influence of change
Desmond is the cowardice in the face of conflict
Penny is the searcher.
Claire is the missing sibling
Charlie is the free spirit who avoids responsibility
Aaron is the symbol for change.
All of these different feelings, fears, emotions, and traits are trapped in Jack’s mind,
in conflict with his memories and his fantasy ideals. In one respect, it resolves only when Jack closes his eyes on the island for the last time (goes asleep) in order to be awakened in - - - a place “he and his (imaginary) friends” created not in the past, or the future but in the now, which may not even reflect the after life at all. It may be the overactive fantasy of the island world coming to a final resolution so his schizophrenic brain could “move on” to its next “adventure.”
Some theorists thought that the whole Lost series was a delusion in Hurley’s mind. It could be said of any of the main characters. But if one recalls the opening and closing eye is Jack’s, then it could be all Jack’s delusion.
LOST REBOOT
Recap: Episodes 81-84 (Days 97-100)
Locke’s camp at the Barracks comes under attack. At least three Locke campers die. Claire is blown up by a rocket exploding her cabin to rubble. Ben miscalculates his plan with the Keamy, who summarily executes Alex. As a result, Ben summons the smoke monster to attack the soldiers as a means of escaping the barracks compound. Dr. Ray’s body, throat slit, washes up on the beach. Jack is finally told the truth about the murderous intentions of the Keamy’s soldiers.
Juliet tells Kate that her kiss was Jack was nothing because he loves someone else after she and Bernard save Jack from his appendicitis, a condition that Rose cannot understand since the Island is a place of healing. Claire wanders off into the jungle after seeing Christian holding Aaron by the camp fire. Sawyer must take the baby back to the beach. In the flash forwards, Jack's relationship with Kate and his mental health begin to deteriorate as he is given a prophetic message from Hurley and sees visions of his dead father at the hospital, after a smoke alarm goes off.
Locke has a “dream” of Horace chopping down trees. He uses that information to find cabin by finding a “magic” map as Hurley calls it in the pocket of dead Horace. Ben laments that “I used to dream.” Pilot Frank balks at going back to the island, knowing that the soldiers will kill everyone there. But after the captain and Dr. Ray are killed, Frank relents but hides a sat phone to drop on the beach camp. Jack believes the phone is a sign from Sayid to follow the copter, but when Sayid arrives with a boat, the camp learns it is the exact opposite. When Kate arrives back at the beach with Miles, she gives Sun Aaron to go off with Sayid to rescue Jack’s party.
Daniel takes six survivors to the Kahana, including Jin, Sun and Aaron, That leaves six people on the beach, including Charlotte, Miles, Rose and Bernard. Jack and Sawyer head toward the copter as Locke, Ben and Hurley go to the greenhouse station, the Orchid, in order to “move the island.” Ben calls it the last resort, a dangerous and perilous act. But the soldiers are already at the station, so Ben gives himself up (with giving Locke no real explanation on how to move the island). Kate and Sayid are captured by Alpert and the Others. In the future, the “Oceanic Six” return to their families on the Mainland after their rescue in Indonesia.
Science:
The concept of space time.
Starting from Issac Newton to Max Plank a definite relationship is supposed to exist between time and space. However it was Einstein who integrated the two in his theory of Relativity and Special theory of Relativity. As per Einstein time and space could be plotted on a graph and theoretically could be traversed in any direction.
Einstein advocated a 4 dimensional universe. This was a revolutionary concept as all along from the Greek philosophers the concept of time and space was 3 dimensional. Einstein added a fourth coordinate time. Einstein also put a limitation to the speed that could be achieved in any medium and that was the speed of light, which was constant in all mediums.
Modern theory of space and time is greatly derived from the concepts of Einstein and to a certain extant Max Plank. Modern thought points to the fact that though time has a direction but there is no practical time reversal. Though theoretically you could see a movie from the beginning or start seeing from the end, yet in real terms the direction of time is one way. Theoretically anything that can happen moving forward through time is just as possible moving backwards in time. Or, put in another way, through the eyes of physics, there will be no distinction, in terms of possibility, between what happens in a movie if the film is run forward, or if the film is run backwards. However our experience of time, at almost all levels shows that time-reversal is not possible. An object may break and fall to pieces on the ground, but the reverse does not happen as the pieces do not fly back and become one again.
Schizophrenia
Not getting enough sleep could be linked with triggering symptoms among people with schizophrenia, suggests a new animal study published in the Neuron journal.
People with schizophrenia frequently experience sleep problems. To find the exact effect disrupted sleep has on the brain with schizophrenia, researchers from the University of Bristol and the Lilly Centre for Cognitive Neuroscience examined brain wave activity of sleeping rats that were engineered to have schizophrenia.
They found that during non-rapid eye movement sleep (NREM sleep, which precedes REM sleep), waves of brain activity normally ripple between the hippocampus and frontal cortex regions of the brain, which play parts in the formation of memories and in decision-making, respectively.
However, when the rats' NREM sleep was fragmented, they found that this brain wave activity was not synchronized.
This is certainly not the first time sleep and schizophrenia have been linked. In 2010, a study in the journal Nature Reviews Neuroscience showed that circadian rhythm disruptions are often experienced by people with psychiatric conditions.
And LiveScience reported on a British Journal of Psychiatry study showing that people who have schizophrenia are also troubled by more sleep problems than people without the condition, which is marked by symptoms of hallucinations, social withdrawal, and memory and attention problems.
"We've been thinking of sleep disruption as one of the genetic, developmental and environmental contributors to the development of these appalling conditions," the researcher of that study, Russell Foster, of the University of Oxford, told LiveScience.
Improbabilities:
Dr. Ray’s dead body floating to the beach faster than a helicopter traveling at speed to the island.
Dr. Ray being alive on the boat on Day 99 but his dead body washed ashore on Day 96.
Ray's body washes up on shore before he is killed because the island is always moving through time (forward and back) and so the time on the island is not the same time as a boat far enough offshore.
Clues:
Jack asks another doctor in the hospital lobby for an instant prescription for sleeping pills due to the stress of his new engagement and work load.
When Locke goes to Jacob’s cabin, and it is Christian present instead, who says he can speak for Jacob, Locke asks what he can do “to save the island.” Christian apparently tells him to “move the island.” But these may be metaphors if you exchange “Jack” for the “island.”
Hurley tells Jack that they are “all dead.” That they never left the island.
Christian tells Locke not to tell anyone that Claire “is with him,” which is a reference to Jack that Claire is dead.
When the smoke alarm goes off in the hospital lobby, Jack finds his ghost father. The connection may be that Christian is a smoke monster, who has the ability to get off the island (Jacob).
When Locke lights the lantern to go into the cabin, it is like a lamp in a genie tale: genies grant wishes much like the island.
When Locke sees Horace skipping and cutting down the same tree over and over again, one believes that it is his dream; or that it could be a skipping or misfunctioning record/hologram program.
Horace tells Locke that he has been dead for 12 years. To find “his cabin,” he has to find him which infers that Jacob was Horace at some point in time.
When Ben confronts Widmore in London in his flash forward, Widmore admits that he drinks because of his nightmares. Ben also asks him why “he changed the rules” and killed his daughter. Widmore rebuffs and says he did no such thing; Ben killed her by his own actions. But Ben then says he will kill Widmore’s daughter, Penny. Widmore scoffs, you can never find her. As a result, both men are “hunting” something: an island and Penny. In reality, Ben could have killed Widmore, but apparently that is against their “rules.” The only one who has that rule is Jacob and MIB.
Hurley says while playing Risk, that “Australia is the key to the game.”
Jack reads to Aaron “.... if I am not the same from this morning - - - that’s the great puzzle.” He later says his father “was a good story teller.”
It Abaddon (the devil?) who tells rehabbing Locke that Locke needs to go on his walkabout in the outback. The Australian country is the symbol of forehell, the beginning of the after life journey for all the lost souls on Flight 815.
Sawyer follows a post-op Jack, who is going after the copter, with the line, “you don’t get to die alone.”
Young Locke “failing” Alpert’s test of what objects “already belong to him.” It flashes back to other stories where priests go to young persons with objects to determine if they are the reincarnated leader, king or god.
Discussion:
“Everything I did in my life that was worthwhile I caught hell for.”
---- Earl Warren
A place where dreams can come true is also a place where nightmares and their fears can also come true. Is the direction of Lost taking us into the various conflicts in Jack’s own mind, as referenced in the flash forward mental deterioration of the leader of the 815 survivors? That theory is more fully developed below.
We do see the fringes coming off Jack’s mental cape. He is slowly beating himself down with mission after mission, decision after decision; the promises are eating away at his soul and he cannot “fix” the situation which is quickly flashing out of control with a mercenary army coming to the island to kill everyone. It is something that Jack himself cannot control, so his mental faculties appear to go haywire.
Another long portion of this arc is the emergence of Locke as the “chosen” one to save the island. If the island is not symbolic for Jack, then the story of Locke is one of injured fish being tossed downstream through the rapids.
We are told that Jacob is the one everyone reports to on the island. And Jacob the name means “following after, supplanter.” It means Jacob “replaced” someone or something. Ben believed that he would one day replace Jacob as the guardian of the island - - - but he was arrogantly wrong. Locke now believes that his destiny is to protect the island, but he also is arrogantly wrong. In the show’s conclusion, we find no true resolution of succession of Jacob because we do not know what kind of “being” he was and what the island “truly represents.” Even if Jacob was a guardian angel guarding the gates of hell (the island), the deaths of the 815 cast would not change his role because in the end, “there are no rules.” If it is a game like backgammon, it was tossed over before it was finished like Locke’s foster sister when Alpert showed up when Locke was a young boy.
Locke’s test could have been the critical evidence of why Locke is “special.” Alpert was present at the hospital after Locke was “miraculously” born after his mother (who was not showing her pregnancy after 6 months) was struck by a car (driven by Cooper). We know that Alpert is immortal messenger of Jacob. Why or how he would know of Locke’s circumstance means that the island has been watching Locke from the beginning. Or if Locke was never born, his soul has been moved along by after life messengers such as Abaddon or Alpert.
Alpert’s test of Locke was interesting (and controversial to fans). The objects presented to Locke were:
A brass compass, which he would receive on the island in the future.
A baseball glove, which could have been Dogan’s from the Temple.
An old book, “The Book of Laws,” a reference Eko made to the Old Testament.
A vial of sand, which is symbolic of the island.
A comic book, Mystery Tales No. 40, with the subtitle “What was the secret of the mysterious HIDDEN LAND!”
A wood handled knife, which is different than the knife collection he brought to his walkabout.
The Comic book lead to a load of fan research. The short stories contained in the issue seemed to brim with island story lines:
"The Hidden Land!" (four pages)
"A Warning Voice!" (four pages)
"The Travelers" (two pages)
"Crossroads of Destiny!" (four pages) — features Roman emperor Julius Caesar (100–44 BC) and Italian navigator Christopher Columbus (1451–1506)
"Sammy's Secret!" (three pages)
"The Silent Stranger" (four pages)
"March Has 32 Days" (four pages), a story about a man who has a chance to re-live a day and change his fate.
The comic may set forth the various themes of the show, but does not clearly indicate that it is the source material for the show.
It would appear that Locke failed the test because he picked the knife. The knife was something he brought to the island; a weapon. The vial of sand as the island was his first choice; and the compass his second. That makes sense for the island would be Jacob’s, and the compass would for direction, or leadership of the island.
It would seem that Alpert was looking for Locke to pick one more item - - - which we would assume would be the old book, as the “rules” of the island are coming into play more and more (as seen in the Ben-Widmore dynamic.)
But Locke failed the first test. In high school, his counselor advised him that a Portland firm was looking for Locke to join them in special research projects. But Locke refused to be a man of science. So he failed the second test. On the island, he failed a third test when he refused to kill his father to show “his commitment” to the Others and the island. But then, he “cheated” his way into the Others camp by having Sawyer kill Cooper. But in the end, Locke failed his final test because he died off the island - - - and his body’s return was used by MIB to wreck havoc on everyone on the island (much like Widmore’s men tried to do.)
It seems that when leaders take it upon themselves to make the final life and death decisions for the betterment of their group, they die physically or emotionally. It is a test that most leaders fail.
One of the main criticisms of Lost was how it created multiple “time” issues without explaining the rational of each, or how the conflicting concepts could be rationalized into a workable science fiction narrative. We have Desmond’s mental “time flashes” to where he literally re-lives portions of his life, and changes the consequences of his past actions. We have Eloise’s commentary that no matter what happens, the universe “course corrects” any time-event changes. We have a physical distortion of the linear time line when Dr. Ray’s dead body floats ashore three days before he is killed. We have time space issues with the island “moving” in the physical world, but depositing people in different times (including Ben months before turning the frozen donkey wheel) to several 815ers zipping back to Dharma, 1977. Then you have the concurrent overlapping of two different time periods on the same island. The only unsatisfying explanation for all these conflicting time elements is that none of them are truly real.
The events, however real they seem, are figments of someone’s imagination. The open question is who’s imagination?
Magical/Supernatural/Elements:
The concept of “moving” a Pacific island.
The fact that Doctor Ray shows up dead on the island beach BEFORE he leaves the freighter (communication).
Last lines in episodes:
EP 81:
BEN: I suppose it is. Sleep tight, Charles.
[Ben leaves, pulling the door shut behind him.]
EP 82:
SAWYER: CLAIRE! CLAIRE!!!
EP 83:
LOCKE: He wants us to move the island.
EP 84:
BEN: My name is Benjamin Linus. I believe you're looking for me.
[Keamy points his gun at Ben's head for a moment before striking him with it.]
New Ideas/Tests of Theories:
“It is all about Jack.”
When at the mental hospital, Hurley tells Jack that they never left the island. Jack thinks he is crazy. But if the references of the island, and the snow globe effect are not real, but the symbolic representation of Jack’s own brain, then Hurley may have a pointed to the ultimate truth.
Many fans believe the series focus was solely around Jack. It was Jack who sacrificed himself in The End so his remaining friends could get off the island. It was all his island friends who were waiting for him in the church at The End. The most intense flash backs and flash forwards are Jack-centric episodes. So there is a lot of evidence that Jack was the keystone to the Lost mythology (even though initially Jack’s character was going to be killed in the first season, for dramatic effect.).
Was Jack not listening to his “inner voice?” Even in cartoons, a character in conflict sometimes has his conscious or inner voice pop up to give him advice, or tell him what to do. It is sometimes shown as good versus evil giving opposite guidance.
It is also an observation that while the island has an inherit “healing” property, during the course of the show, Jack’s physical and mental conditions deteriorate. It begins with the stress of being the defacto leader of the survivors, and grows to sleepless burden of the weight of his world upon his shoulders to make life and death decisions, to the inconsistent to irrational mental decisions, including objective threats of killing people who crossed him.
The lack of sleep, addiction to pain medications, haunted memories and questionable decision making are all symptoms of a sleep depressed person with schizophrenia.
We have discussed various theories, including mental instability and subconscious dream states, as explanations for the various inconsistent and improbable island story arcs. One theory that could tie many of these other theories together would be through Jack.
Jack has been considered the pillar of strength during the series. But what if he was really a pillar of salt? If all the story lines intersect through Jack’s consciousness, then what or who are these strangers in his island world?
The characters surrounding Jack could represent his inner emotional states. Hurley could be symbolic of his conflict with gluttony such as addictions. Kate could be symbolic of his conflict with women, relationships such as irrational jealousy. Sawyer could be symbolic of his conflict with bullies, such as his school yard fights. Locke could be symbolic of his conflict with authority figures, such as a father figure he would not listen to in his actions.
As the series will grind on, Jack will tell himself more and more that “he should have listened to Locke.” As a person who thought he could save anyone, Jack could never listen to others to save himself. Or so the theory would go. Locke, as a paralysis victim of an 8 story fall, is not seen in Jack’s world (the island) as a wheelchair bound disabled person because Jack can fix anything or anyone. Jack is a miracle worker; “miracles” happen on his watch.
But even miracles have their back story limits. The miracle births of Locke and Ben made them “special” in the eyes of the island watchers. The miracle transformation of paralyzed man into outback hunter to the Others made Locke again “special.” The ability to do complex back surgery on Ben without modern technology or specialist help was Jack “working” another miracle. But for each miracle, Jack seems to get punished. By whom? Himself.
Jack, as a doctor or as a son of a doctor, would have had contact with many medical patients, unique histories and personality traits to have a expansive knowledge of human behavior and frail human emotional disorders. He said Christian “was a good story teller.” He may have inherited the ability to fantasize a unique, bizarre world which somehow came unglued or out of control with his own schizophrenia.
Jack wears down in the series because he is always “running” including his mind when he tries to sleep. Experts debate the basic proposition of why people need to go to sleep. It is believed that rest revitalizes the body, restores energy and heals body systems. It is also considered that when one sleeps, the brain is limiting its functions so
the body had repair neurotransmitters in the brain. It may also be that the brain “de-fragments” the waking observations, thoughts and materials into memories to be accessed in the future by the waking mind.
Scientists also do not understand why humans dream when they sleep. There appears to be no biologic function. Some believe that dreams are merely an unintended consequence of the brain repairing itself while at rest; reshuffling the memory files triggers some secondary active visions. Other scientists believe that dreams are a primal way of humans to “test” activities and events in order to be better prepared for the real, waking world. In primitive societies, the basic fears of being attacked by predators is a tenet of nightmares. But if one dreams of situations where one could fend
off such attacks, the waking person would be better prepared when it actually happens.
So what if the basic brain repair function goes haywire? You have a person in acute distress over time. The brain does not function normally; it cannot focus clearly because memories and reality begin to jumble, intersect, collide. If a person has a deep fantasy gene, or multiple personalities, that person’s mind could run wild. Escaping reality into one’s own subconscious fantasy could be the reason why so many show elements are connected through Jack.
For example, the numbers are not Hurley’s or Leonard’s curse. The numbers were “on the island” before they knew about them. The numbers supersede their knowledge or meaning because it already exists in “the island world.” If the island world is Jack’s own mind, as a formula representation of how to save his world (personal Valenzetti equation).
Lost theories have transposed the numbers in latent character personalities that they seem to represent in the story,
Locke (4) is seen as faith, hope or
Hurley (8) is seen a compassion or good will
Sawyer (15) is seen as change or personal growth
Sayid (16) is seen as common sense or order
Jack (23) is seen as rational self
Jin (42) is seen as family or love.
Alternative “human” factors for each character was thought to be
Locke (4) as intuition
Hurley (8) as perception
Sawyer (15) as feeling
Sayid (16) as judgment
Jack (23) as thinking
Jin (42) as sensation.
But if one puts all these characters into Jack’s own mind, we get a better clue.
Locke (4) is something broken that needs to be fixed
Hurley (8) is seen as a cursed addiction to be remedied
Sawyer (15) is an angry kid who can’t be responsible and grow up
Sayid (16) is smart individual who succumbs to rages of madness
Jack (23) is seen as his conflicted self
Jin (42) is the representation of the foreign and unknown aspects of the world.
If you add other major characters:
Kate is the embodiment of jealousy in relationships
Juliet is the tension between professional and unprofessional behavior.
Rose and Bernard as representation of soul mates
Boone as the naive follower.
Shannon as the spoiled child.
Libby is the calming influence of change
Desmond is the cowardice in the face of conflict
Penny is the searcher.
Claire is the missing sibling
Charlie is the free spirit who avoids responsibility
Aaron is the symbol for change.
All of these different feelings, fears, emotions, and traits are trapped in Jack’s mind,
in conflict with his memories and his fantasy ideals. In one respect, it resolves only when Jack closes his eyes on the island for the last time (goes asleep) in order to be awakened in - - - a place “he and his (imaginary) friends” created not in the past, or the future but in the now, which may not even reflect the after life at all. It may be the overactive fantasy of the island world coming to a final resolution so his schizophrenic brain could “move on” to its next “adventure.”
Some theorists thought that the whole Lost series was a delusion in Hurley’s mind. It could be said of any of the main characters. But if one recalls the opening and closing eye is Jack’s, then it could be all Jack’s delusion.
Thursday, November 29, 2012
REBOOT EPISODES 77-80
POSTING NOTE: Due to work changes, I may not be able to post updates on Tuesdays after Monday night marathon G4 reruns, but updates will occur later in the week.
LOST REBOOT
Recap: Episodes 77-80 (Days 94-97)
Sayid and Desmond meet the crew members on freighter, while the latter experiences some unexpected side effects from the trip, when his mind bounces back and forth from 1996. The helicopter hits turbulence on its way to the freighter, and Desmond experiences unexpected side effects; as his consciousness travels in time he and a key character discover their “constants.” The episode follows Desmond's consciousness in a continuous narrative.
Juliet receives an unwelcome visit from someone from her past, Harper, and is given orders to track down Charlotte and Daniel in order to stop them from completing their mission of getting Ben. Meanwhile, Ben offers Locke an enticing deal. Juliet is walking through the jungle and suddenly hears the whispers. She looks around and finds Harper standing behind her, who says that Ben has a message for her: Daniel and Charlotte are heading towards the Tempest station, and Juliet has to stop them, using deadly force if necessary. If Daniel and Charlotte figure out how to deploy the gas, everyone is going to die. Juliet asks why Harper doesn't stop them herself, and Harper answers that it is Ben's wish that Juliet does it, and says that although Ben is a prisoner, he is "exactly where he wants to be." Harper says that Juliet must kill Daniel and Charlotte. The conversation is interrupted by Jack, who points his gun at Harper and demands to know who she is. She says she is an old friend of Juliet’s and she was telling her where the people they are looking for are headed and that Jack with his gun should go there too. The whispers are heard again, and Harper suddenly disappears.
Juliet is forced to reveal some startling news to Jin when Sun threatens to move to Locke’s camp. Juliet warns Jin that Sun is very ill and will die within three weeks if she doesn’t leave the Island, but Jin doesn't appear to understand what Juliet is saying, and Sun refuses to translate. Sun is not swayed and Jin supports her, saying: “Where Sun go, I go.” Meanwhile, Sayid and Desmond begin to get an idea of the freighter crew’s mission when they meet the ship’s captain, who has a militaristic tone.
Sayid confronts Michael, Ben’s spy on the freighter while Ben urges Alex to flee Locke’s camp to go the temple in order to survive an impending attack from the freighter crew. Sayid insists on learning why Michael was on the boat. Michael answers, “I’m here to die.”
Later, Sayid and Desmond find Michael in the engine room and confront him about why he is on the boat. Michael tells his story about being Ben's tool. When he is finished, Sayid asks him if he is truly working for Ben. Michael confirms this. Sayid grabs Michael and drags him into Captain Gault's room, revealing Michael's true identity as the saboteur, a spy, a traitor, and a survivor of Flight 815.
Science:
“Minkowski” as a crew name as a clue to the freighter situation. Hermann Minkowski was a scientist and peer of Albert Einstein. Minkowski’s work dealt with the concept of space-time. By 1907 Minkowski realized that Einstein’s special theory of relativity could be best understood in a four dimensional space, in which time and space are not separated entities but intermingled in a four dimensional space-time. Minkowski said "The views of space and time which I wish to lay before you have sprung from the soil of experimental physics, and therein lies their strength. They are radical. Henceforth space by itself, and time by itself, are doomed to fade away into mere shadows, and only a kind of union of the two will preserve an independent reality."
“Faraday” as a scientist as a clue to the island electromagnetic properties. Michael Faraday was a 19th century English scientist who contributed to the fields of electromagnetism and electrochemistry. His main discoveries include those of electromagnetic induction, diamagnetism, and electrolysis. It was by his research on the magnetic field around a conductor carrying a direct current that Faraday established the basis for the concept of the electromagnetic field in physics. Faraday also established that magnetism could affect rays of light and that there was an underlying relationship between the two phenomena. His inventions of electromagnetic rotary devices formed the foundation of electric motor technology, and it was largely due to his efforts that electricity became practical for use in technology.
The island as a large machine, which creates it own electromagnetic field, as referenced in the snow globe effect. And if this island electromagnetic field interfaces with Minkowski’s four dimensional space time to alter an individual’s reality in time.
Improbabilities:
When Capt. Gault shows Sayid the black box flight recorder from Flight 815, alleged “acquired” by Widmore, is unbelievable. Any plane crash debris, especially the flight recorder, would be impounded as critical investigative evidence by the NTSB. Further, Gault claims that the Flight 815 wreckage was “staged” by a man with great resources and serial killer motives to “find” 324 bodies for the wreck site: Ben. If one can film the wreck, and recover the flight recorder, the recover of other plane parts and bodies would be possible. With airliners having serial numbers on all parts and detailed records, it is impossible to “duplicate” a plane in a matter of weeks.
The concept of “mind jumps” from 1996 to 2004 caused by exposure to oscillating radiation frequencies. Further, the need for an “anchor” in both time periods would not cause Minkowski and other crew members to die because everyone has a parent, sibling, friend or co-worker in both time frames. The conscious imbalance and alleged brain trauma caused by severed “memories” from two time periods cannot cause physical harm - - - at best, it seems to cue schizophrenic behavior.
Frank being able to hold the helicopter on a bearing while flying through a thunderstorm.
Clues:
On the helicopter ride, Desmond “flashes” or mind jumps. One remarks whether he is “day dreaming.”
The Numbers may be Hurley’s curse, but they are also Desmond’s numbers. Penny’s apartment number in his latest mind jump and the setting for Daniel’s Eloise experiment are part of the Numbers.
Frank travels to the lower level of the ship, where he meets Regina, who seems somewhat distant and a little confused. He tells her that the captain wants him to bring the paper bag (to Sayid and Desmond), and that the book she is reading, The Survivors of the Chancellor, is upside down.
The book written by Jules Verne is about the final voyage of a British sailing ship, the Chancellor, told from the perspective of one of its passengers from his diary. In the story, one of the crew members commits suicide Later, Regina in chains, jumps overboard to her death while the crew watches. It seems people think of their fate, it happens to them.
Juliet explains that all pregnant women on the island do not come to term; in the second trimester there is nausea, followed by pain, unconsciousness then COMA, then death. However, her explanation that the body’s immune system attacks the mother by “white blood cells decreasing” is the opposite of an immune response (another gross medical error).
When Michael attempts suicide in a car crash, he awakes in a hospital room next to a comatose patient. A vision of ghost Libby appears to him. Then, Michael tries to commit suicide with a loaded gun, but it jams. He is told that the island won’t let him die. But when he is on the freighter, he tells Sayid that he is on the boat “to die.”
When Ben plays his “last card” of a secret video tape of Widmore, Ben says the blindfolded man “was one of his men” who gets severely beaten. That man appears to be Desmond in 1996.
The whispers in the jungle when Juliet is heading for the Tempest:
"Sarah is having another..." "Is that the other woman?"
Right when Juliet runs into Harper in the jungle:
"Look out" "Sarah is having another..."
"Did you hear that?"
"If she won't save us then who is?"
"Sarah, somebody's coming"
"There is somebody coming"
"Hold on one second"
"There is somebody coming"
After Jack runs into Juliet and Harper:
"Look out"
“Sarah, it's someone we know. Sarah, it's someone we know"
"I'm not answering"
"Answer them"
"We have our answer"
"Can we trust her?"
The “Sarah” we know is Jack’s ex-wife, the woman he “miraculously” cured after her auto accident. The consensus is that when people die around the Island but cannot "move on" to the next stage, they remain as whispers, watching or trying to communicate with the living on the Island. Characters often hear them when in peril, or when the Others or the Smoke Monster are near. The deceased whisperers can appear in their physical form only to a select few. If so, why is Sarah’s soul trapped on the island? Or are these whispers the echoes of people in Jack’s life, trapped in his mind?
Sarah should not be on the island; she moved on without Jack. It was Jack who could not let go of her. And now, a mental conflict inside of Jack about "moving on" from Sarah with another woman (Juliet?)
Daniel’s concept of a “constant” in both “worlds” is a clue that Desmond’s freighter flashes were not flashbacks, but connections in the sideways world, a parallel reality that once breached (known) can cause death if not controlled by a strong singularity in both worlds.
Discussion:
“ A word too much always defeats its purpose. ”
— Arthur Schopenhauer
Locke said there are no reason for rules if there is no punishment for breaking them. In the series, we have numerous “unwritten” rules, especially those island rules of Jacob, and the rules between Ben and Widmore in their feud.
Rules are defined as: a) one of a set of explicit or understood regulations or principles governing conduct within a particular activity or sphere: the rules of the game were understood, b) a law or principle that operates within a particular sphere of knowledge, describing or prescribing what is possible or allowable: the rules of grammar. c) a code of practice and discipline for a religious order or community, or d) control of or dominion over an area or people.The word is from Latin, regula, meaning “straight stick.”
Somehow, the rules have been broken. And now there is the word, “war,” on the lips of Ben and the Others. Who is at war?
Jack thinks the survivors are at war with the Others. Locke had thought that too, until he became a splinter cell leader.
The Others think they are at war with the survivors for killing their people.
Ben thinks he is at war with Widmore’s men on the freighter.
But the twists on the freighter (more for shock value than plot movement) call into play a larger "con" being conducted on the characters. It is an emotional roller coaster when Michael's bomb does not explode, when Desmond incredibly "calls" Penny on Christmas eve, when Regina commits suicide and no one cares, and when the captain tells them the elaborate hoax of the Flight 815 wreckage (since there is no need to tell people where the false wreckage is when no one can find the island to begin with - - - it took the Black Rock journal purchased by Widmore to find the island). Who is running the con on the characters? Apparently, the all-powerful being called "the island" is calling the the life and death shots of the characters.
In the final season, we will learn that Jacob is at odds with his brother, MIB, but you cannot call their dispute a war. It is more a difference of opinion. A wager on the outcome of humans brought to the island for some unknown purpose. All we know is that MIB has continually won this wager and has grown tired of the characters brought to the island because in the end, they all wind up corrupting themselves.
We also still here that some people are “special.” But in island terms, what does that mean? Ben infers that he is special because he “was born on the island.” This is a false statement in physical reality; he was prematurely born on the mainland, in the forest, with his parents. Locke has also been called “special,” and he was also a “miracle” baby as he was born prematurely in a rural town after his mother was hit by a car driven by his biological father. Jacob and his brother are also “special,” because they have immortal and magical powers. Is it because they were truly “born” on the island, after a shipwreck? Or are all these persons “special” because they were “born” in a different dimension, in the island after life realm?
One last person was called “special.” Walt showed that he had telekinetic powers, so much so that his adoptive father was so spooked by his special talents that he pushed Walt off onto Michael to raise after Walt’s mother’s death. We do not have any information on Walt’s actual birth to put him in the same classification as Ben or Locke. But Walt shows one aspect of Jacob and MIB as he materializes as ghost Walt to Locke to tell the bleeding man to get up because he still has “work” to do.
Which leads us to another nebulous word from the series, “work.” What is the “work” that drives people forward in the series. The Others, including Richard Alpert, have been worried about Ben’s sidetracking to other issues like the fertility question over the Other’s primary mission. But we have no idea what the Others “goal in life” is on the island, except to fear outsiders.
What is Locke’s “work” that he needs to accomplish? He has nothing to go back to off the island. In fact, his life was pretty much a miserable wreck. Is the work to be completed the coup of Ben’s leadership? Is it to become the island’s new guardian?
The 815ers have no clear mission either. First, it was survival. Second, it was living together or dying alone. Third, it was battling the Others. Fourth, it was rescue. Then, rescue concept tore the group in half. And then, when some of the survivors actually leave the island, they are compelled to return to the island.
The Tempest scene was badly conceived and poorly executed. First, the concept of Dan knowing the computer codes to change a chemical plant system is not credible. Second, the warning of the activation of the plant makes no sense. The plant was inactive when Charlotte and Dan arrived. There was no need to “de-activate it.” Third, when Juliet arrives to stop them, she passes the main power switch. She could have simply “turned” off the station’s power! Fourth, Daniel claims that he is there is make the chemical gas “inert.” However, an inert gas or noble gas, any of the elements in Group 18 of the periodic table. In order of increasing atomic number they are: helium, neon, argon, krypton, xenon and radon. They are colorless, odorless, tasteless gases and were once believed to be entirely inert, i.e., forming no chemical compounds. So that is not what Daniel could do at a computer console. In order to neutralize a poisonous gas, something has to react to it. In 2005, Czech scientists believe they found the first known neutralizer for mustard gas:
An enzyme [employed through their method] reacts within minutes, is able to split several molecules of mustard gas per second, and its decontaminating effect is expected to last for hours at an average temperature of 30 degrees Celsius.
The problem is that Daniel is not neutralizing the gas: the computer screen ends with notation that a valve has been secured. It appears that the whole drama was for naught; a double, double cross. Are the freighters friend or foe? If a friend, why are they lying to the survivors? If they are a foe, why not use the gas and kill everyone? No wonder no trusts anyone anymore.
Is this why the whispers of Sarah talk about "trust?" The whole basis of the island story could be summed up as the mental instability of Jack. He is the one who could never get over Sarah. She was the one he fixed, but he could not fix their relationship. When he tries to commit suicide, it is Sarah who appears before him - - - and he wants to be with her, but she refuses and leaves. Sarah is one of the elements in Jack's life that he cannot get over. Likewise, it is Christian's berating that Jack cannot make the hard decisions, the life and more importantly, the death decisions. As such, he can never be a leader. He can never be a good doctor. So in a way, the island and its plots could center around the mental issues (or character flaws) of Jack not being able to "get over" Sarah and "move on" with another woman and the fact that he cannot "save" every life; and at times he needs to "take" lives in order for others to live. It would be an agonizing dynamic in a tortured soul's mind to try to reconcile those deep rooted beliefs; but that is what Jack does at the End.
The characters now appear to be rats in a complex maze. When Michael attempts to set off the bomb on the freighter, it surprises Ben that he actually attempted it. So the bomb was rigged NOT to explode. Instead, Ben ordered Michael to get a “list” of crew, then disable the radio room and engines. Why? If the whole purpose is to “stop” the crew from getting to the island, why not stop them dead in the water by exploding the bomb? The only reason is that Ben “wants” the crew to arrive at the island; that he wants “them” to do the dirty work of killing everyone but his “chosen” people (meaning all the 815ers). But Ben will stumble over his own arrogance, because when he sets Alex off to safety, Karl and Rousseau are both killed, and Alex is captured by Keamy’s ship crew. In one respect, this incident fulfills a wish of Ben’s: to get rid of Alex’s boyfriend and her mother. But the consequences for that decision will be grave.
Magical/Supernatural/Elements:
The concept of “constants” and mental “time travel.”
The “whispers” are trapped souls left on the island.
The island “not allowing” Michael to commit suicide on at least two occasions, because Tom has Michael “has work to do” to save his friends still on the Island.
Last lines in episodes:
EP 77:
DESMOND: Aye. I'm perfect.
[Daniel is on the beach flipping through his journal. On a page, he sees: "If anything goes wrong, Desmond Hume will be MY constant."]
EP 78:
BEN: [cheerfully] See you guys at dinner.
[Ben marches into a house and shuts the door behind him, leaving Sawyer and Hurley dumbfounded.]
EP 79:
[Hurley and Sun are at a cemetery, Sun holding the baby. They approach Jin's tombstone. Sun kneels down, crying.]
SUN: [Subtitle: Jin... You were right. It's a girl. The delivery was hard on me... The doctor said I was calling out for you... I wish you could've been there. Jin... she's beautiful. Ji Yeon. I named her just like you wanted. I miss you so much. I miss you so much.]
EP 80:
ALEX: Wait! Wait! Don't! I'm Ben's daughter! I'm his daughter!
New Ideas/Tests of Theories:
In the last Reboot, we fully developed two “Unified Theories” to the Lost mythology to explain all of the factual and legal impossibilities in the actual Lost scripts. The Dream State theory postulates that the characters are alive in reality, but in a deep coma state where their minds have split in the dream world of the island and the fantasy world of the sideways realm. In the Egyptian After Life theory, the characters are already dead before the plane crash, and that their souls have been split between the underworld (island world) and the spirit world (sideways).
Using the science concepts of Minkowski and Faraday, one could extract a science-fiction basis for the island itself. It has been debated whether the Island is a character, a person or a place. If one combines Faraday’s electromagnetic physics with Minkowski’s theories of space-time, the Island can be seen as a unique “machine,” creating its own electromagnetic field a part from the Earth, which creates an opening portal, nexus or intersection into the four dimensions of space-time. This portal connection to space-time would allow an individual to go back into the past (to change events) or go forward into the future (to see the future events). The island’s power is one of a living time machine. Any person of wealth or stature would want to “control” the ability to control a time machine. One could make a fortune knowing the future, or changing the past. This may be the motivation for Widmore’s attempt to reclaim the Island from Ben and the Others. At the same time, this may be the motivation for Ben to keep people from coming and going from the island. It’s power must remain a captive secret so the island is not over-run by “miracle seekers.”
So what is the Island?
We know various story “facts” about the island. First, it appears to be a Pacific tropic island, believed to be located somewhere near Fiji. Second, based on the freighter rocket experiment, it is moving away at a fairly rapid speed. Third, based on the helicopter flights, it is difficult to get because there is only one “door way” inside the mask or cloaked atmosphere that surrounds the island itself. Fourth, the island contains “unique” electromagnetic properties. It appears that the Hatch was constructed after an “incident” to control the “discharge” of any electromagnetic build-up. Fifth, Faraday remarks that the island “scatters light” differently than normal. Sixth, we will learn later that the island contains a cave containing a “life force.” Seventh, there is speculation whether the smoke monster is mechanical, nanotech, spiritual or an organic beast.
So what is the Island?
Various theories have been postulated over the years.
One, is that the island is the bridge between earth and hell, a place of limbo where the dead or near-dead act out their last days before the after life journey begins.
Two, is that the island is actually hell, and souls incorporated into human form must journey through various dangerous but familiar “tests” to determine whether they are worthy of redemption and a fantasy life in heaven.
Three, is that the island is a fantasy game show, like the movie West World, but abandoned and taken over by evil spirits.
Four, is that the island is an alien space ship that has trapped people in its snow globe field to view humanity at its basic level.
Fifth, is that the island is merely a collective, networked dream of various characters who are in a state of coma or deep dreaming.
Sixth, is that the island is an alien time machine that has crash landed on earth, and the forces of good and evil are trying to control it.
Seventh, is that the island is ancient Atlantis, a highly advanced civilization that had mastered the elements and dimensions of time travel.
Eighth, is that the island is an ancient Egyptian portal to the underworld, created to help their pharaohs in the after life achieve great power and immortality.
Ninth, is that the island represents the subconscious of a troubled person, trapped in his or her own personal fantasy land.
Tenth, is that the island is a living being of supernatural powers, who uses human beings as pawns for his amusement.
Eleventh, is that the island is a prison for Satan, who is trapped by the electromagnetic fields created by messengers (angels) in order to “save the (human) world” from destruction.
Twelfth, is that the island is a quantum portal, a black hole in the fabric of the universe, that allows parallel universes (the multiverse theory) to come into contact with each other, either physically or mentally in time jumps.
Thirteen, is that the island is a metaphor for god, in how he gives people choices but allows their individual’s free will to guide their decision making to make their own choices; but with consequences for their actions, good or bad.
LOST REBOOT
Recap: Episodes 77-80 (Days 94-97)
Sayid and Desmond meet the crew members on freighter, while the latter experiences some unexpected side effects from the trip, when his mind bounces back and forth from 1996. The helicopter hits turbulence on its way to the freighter, and Desmond experiences unexpected side effects; as his consciousness travels in time he and a key character discover their “constants.” The episode follows Desmond's consciousness in a continuous narrative.
Juliet receives an unwelcome visit from someone from her past, Harper, and is given orders to track down Charlotte and Daniel in order to stop them from completing their mission of getting Ben. Meanwhile, Ben offers Locke an enticing deal. Juliet is walking through the jungle and suddenly hears the whispers. She looks around and finds Harper standing behind her, who says that Ben has a message for her: Daniel and Charlotte are heading towards the Tempest station, and Juliet has to stop them, using deadly force if necessary. If Daniel and Charlotte figure out how to deploy the gas, everyone is going to die. Juliet asks why Harper doesn't stop them herself, and Harper answers that it is Ben's wish that Juliet does it, and says that although Ben is a prisoner, he is "exactly where he wants to be." Harper says that Juliet must kill Daniel and Charlotte. The conversation is interrupted by Jack, who points his gun at Harper and demands to know who she is. She says she is an old friend of Juliet’s and she was telling her where the people they are looking for are headed and that Jack with his gun should go there too. The whispers are heard again, and Harper suddenly disappears.
Juliet is forced to reveal some startling news to Jin when Sun threatens to move to Locke’s camp. Juliet warns Jin that Sun is very ill and will die within three weeks if she doesn’t leave the Island, but Jin doesn't appear to understand what Juliet is saying, and Sun refuses to translate. Sun is not swayed and Jin supports her, saying: “Where Sun go, I go.” Meanwhile, Sayid and Desmond begin to get an idea of the freighter crew’s mission when they meet the ship’s captain, who has a militaristic tone.
Sayid confronts Michael, Ben’s spy on the freighter while Ben urges Alex to flee Locke’s camp to go the temple in order to survive an impending attack from the freighter crew. Sayid insists on learning why Michael was on the boat. Michael answers, “I’m here to die.”
Later, Sayid and Desmond find Michael in the engine room and confront him about why he is on the boat. Michael tells his story about being Ben's tool. When he is finished, Sayid asks him if he is truly working for Ben. Michael confirms this. Sayid grabs Michael and drags him into Captain Gault's room, revealing Michael's true identity as the saboteur, a spy, a traitor, and a survivor of Flight 815.
Science:
“Minkowski” as a crew name as a clue to the freighter situation. Hermann Minkowski was a scientist and peer of Albert Einstein. Minkowski’s work dealt with the concept of space-time. By 1907 Minkowski realized that Einstein’s special theory of relativity could be best understood in a four dimensional space, in which time and space are not separated entities but intermingled in a four dimensional space-time. Minkowski said "The views of space and time which I wish to lay before you have sprung from the soil of experimental physics, and therein lies their strength. They are radical. Henceforth space by itself, and time by itself, are doomed to fade away into mere shadows, and only a kind of union of the two will preserve an independent reality."
“Faraday” as a scientist as a clue to the island electromagnetic properties. Michael Faraday was a 19th century English scientist who contributed to the fields of electromagnetism and electrochemistry. His main discoveries include those of electromagnetic induction, diamagnetism, and electrolysis. It was by his research on the magnetic field around a conductor carrying a direct current that Faraday established the basis for the concept of the electromagnetic field in physics. Faraday also established that magnetism could affect rays of light and that there was an underlying relationship between the two phenomena. His inventions of electromagnetic rotary devices formed the foundation of electric motor technology, and it was largely due to his efforts that electricity became practical for use in technology.
The island as a large machine, which creates it own electromagnetic field, as referenced in the snow globe effect. And if this island electromagnetic field interfaces with Minkowski’s four dimensional space time to alter an individual’s reality in time.
Improbabilities:
When Capt. Gault shows Sayid the black box flight recorder from Flight 815, alleged “acquired” by Widmore, is unbelievable. Any plane crash debris, especially the flight recorder, would be impounded as critical investigative evidence by the NTSB. Further, Gault claims that the Flight 815 wreckage was “staged” by a man with great resources and serial killer motives to “find” 324 bodies for the wreck site: Ben. If one can film the wreck, and recover the flight recorder, the recover of other plane parts and bodies would be possible. With airliners having serial numbers on all parts and detailed records, it is impossible to “duplicate” a plane in a matter of weeks.
The concept of “mind jumps” from 1996 to 2004 caused by exposure to oscillating radiation frequencies. Further, the need for an “anchor” in both time periods would not cause Minkowski and other crew members to die because everyone has a parent, sibling, friend or co-worker in both time frames. The conscious imbalance and alleged brain trauma caused by severed “memories” from two time periods cannot cause physical harm - - - at best, it seems to cue schizophrenic behavior.
Frank being able to hold the helicopter on a bearing while flying through a thunderstorm.
Clues:
On the helicopter ride, Desmond “flashes” or mind jumps. One remarks whether he is “day dreaming.”
The Numbers may be Hurley’s curse, but they are also Desmond’s numbers. Penny’s apartment number in his latest mind jump and the setting for Daniel’s Eloise experiment are part of the Numbers.
Frank travels to the lower level of the ship, where he meets Regina, who seems somewhat distant and a little confused. He tells her that the captain wants him to bring the paper bag (to Sayid and Desmond), and that the book she is reading, The Survivors of the Chancellor, is upside down.
The book written by Jules Verne is about the final voyage of a British sailing ship, the Chancellor, told from the perspective of one of its passengers from his diary. In the story, one of the crew members commits suicide Later, Regina in chains, jumps overboard to her death while the crew watches. It seems people think of their fate, it happens to them.
Juliet explains that all pregnant women on the island do not come to term; in the second trimester there is nausea, followed by pain, unconsciousness then COMA, then death. However, her explanation that the body’s immune system attacks the mother by “white blood cells decreasing” is the opposite of an immune response (another gross medical error).
When Michael attempts suicide in a car crash, he awakes in a hospital room next to a comatose patient. A vision of ghost Libby appears to him. Then, Michael tries to commit suicide with a loaded gun, but it jams. He is told that the island won’t let him die. But when he is on the freighter, he tells Sayid that he is on the boat “to die.”
When Ben plays his “last card” of a secret video tape of Widmore, Ben says the blindfolded man “was one of his men” who gets severely beaten. That man appears to be Desmond in 1996.
The whispers in the jungle when Juliet is heading for the Tempest:
"Sarah is having another..." "Is that the other woman?"
Right when Juliet runs into Harper in the jungle:
"Look out" "Sarah is having another..."
"Did you hear that?"
"If she won't save us then who is?"
"Sarah, somebody's coming"
"There is somebody coming"
"Hold on one second"
"There is somebody coming"
After Jack runs into Juliet and Harper:
"Look out"
“Sarah, it's someone we know. Sarah, it's someone we know"
"I'm not answering"
"Answer them"
"We have our answer"
"Can we trust her?"
The “Sarah” we know is Jack’s ex-wife, the woman he “miraculously” cured after her auto accident. The consensus is that when people die around the Island but cannot "move on" to the next stage, they remain as whispers, watching or trying to communicate with the living on the Island. Characters often hear them when in peril, or when the Others or the Smoke Monster are near. The deceased whisperers can appear in their physical form only to a select few. If so, why is Sarah’s soul trapped on the island? Or are these whispers the echoes of people in Jack’s life, trapped in his mind?
Sarah should not be on the island; she moved on without Jack. It was Jack who could not let go of her. And now, a mental conflict inside of Jack about "moving on" from Sarah with another woman (Juliet?)
Daniel’s concept of a “constant” in both “worlds” is a clue that Desmond’s freighter flashes were not flashbacks, but connections in the sideways world, a parallel reality that once breached (known) can cause death if not controlled by a strong singularity in both worlds.
Discussion:
“ A word too much always defeats its purpose. ”
— Arthur Schopenhauer
Locke said there are no reason for rules if there is no punishment for breaking them. In the series, we have numerous “unwritten” rules, especially those island rules of Jacob, and the rules between Ben and Widmore in their feud.
Rules are defined as: a) one of a set of explicit or understood regulations or principles governing conduct within a particular activity or sphere: the rules of the game were understood, b) a law or principle that operates within a particular sphere of knowledge, describing or prescribing what is possible or allowable: the rules of grammar. c) a code of practice and discipline for a religious order or community, or d) control of or dominion over an area or people.The word is from Latin, regula, meaning “straight stick.”
Somehow, the rules have been broken. And now there is the word, “war,” on the lips of Ben and the Others. Who is at war?
Jack thinks the survivors are at war with the Others. Locke had thought that too, until he became a splinter cell leader.
The Others think they are at war with the survivors for killing their people.
Ben thinks he is at war with Widmore’s men on the freighter.
But the twists on the freighter (more for shock value than plot movement) call into play a larger "con" being conducted on the characters. It is an emotional roller coaster when Michael's bomb does not explode, when Desmond incredibly "calls" Penny on Christmas eve, when Regina commits suicide and no one cares, and when the captain tells them the elaborate hoax of the Flight 815 wreckage (since there is no need to tell people where the false wreckage is when no one can find the island to begin with - - - it took the Black Rock journal purchased by Widmore to find the island). Who is running the con on the characters? Apparently, the all-powerful being called "the island" is calling the the life and death shots of the characters.
In the final season, we will learn that Jacob is at odds with his brother, MIB, but you cannot call their dispute a war. It is more a difference of opinion. A wager on the outcome of humans brought to the island for some unknown purpose. All we know is that MIB has continually won this wager and has grown tired of the characters brought to the island because in the end, they all wind up corrupting themselves.
We also still here that some people are “special.” But in island terms, what does that mean? Ben infers that he is special because he “was born on the island.” This is a false statement in physical reality; he was prematurely born on the mainland, in the forest, with his parents. Locke has also been called “special,” and he was also a “miracle” baby as he was born prematurely in a rural town after his mother was hit by a car driven by his biological father. Jacob and his brother are also “special,” because they have immortal and magical powers. Is it because they were truly “born” on the island, after a shipwreck? Or are all these persons “special” because they were “born” in a different dimension, in the island after life realm?
One last person was called “special.” Walt showed that he had telekinetic powers, so much so that his adoptive father was so spooked by his special talents that he pushed Walt off onto Michael to raise after Walt’s mother’s death. We do not have any information on Walt’s actual birth to put him in the same classification as Ben or Locke. But Walt shows one aspect of Jacob and MIB as he materializes as ghost Walt to Locke to tell the bleeding man to get up because he still has “work” to do.
Which leads us to another nebulous word from the series, “work.” What is the “work” that drives people forward in the series. The Others, including Richard Alpert, have been worried about Ben’s sidetracking to other issues like the fertility question over the Other’s primary mission. But we have no idea what the Others “goal in life” is on the island, except to fear outsiders.
What is Locke’s “work” that he needs to accomplish? He has nothing to go back to off the island. In fact, his life was pretty much a miserable wreck. Is the work to be completed the coup of Ben’s leadership? Is it to become the island’s new guardian?
The 815ers have no clear mission either. First, it was survival. Second, it was living together or dying alone. Third, it was battling the Others. Fourth, it was rescue. Then, rescue concept tore the group in half. And then, when some of the survivors actually leave the island, they are compelled to return to the island.
The Tempest scene was badly conceived and poorly executed. First, the concept of Dan knowing the computer codes to change a chemical plant system is not credible. Second, the warning of the activation of the plant makes no sense. The plant was inactive when Charlotte and Dan arrived. There was no need to “de-activate it.” Third, when Juliet arrives to stop them, she passes the main power switch. She could have simply “turned” off the station’s power! Fourth, Daniel claims that he is there is make the chemical gas “inert.” However, an inert gas or noble gas, any of the elements in Group 18 of the periodic table. In order of increasing atomic number they are: helium, neon, argon, krypton, xenon and radon. They are colorless, odorless, tasteless gases and were once believed to be entirely inert, i.e., forming no chemical compounds. So that is not what Daniel could do at a computer console. In order to neutralize a poisonous gas, something has to react to it. In 2005, Czech scientists believe they found the first known neutralizer for mustard gas:
An enzyme [employed through their method] reacts within minutes, is able to split several molecules of mustard gas per second, and its decontaminating effect is expected to last for hours at an average temperature of 30 degrees Celsius.
The problem is that Daniel is not neutralizing the gas: the computer screen ends with notation that a valve has been secured. It appears that the whole drama was for naught; a double, double cross. Are the freighters friend or foe? If a friend, why are they lying to the survivors? If they are a foe, why not use the gas and kill everyone? No wonder no trusts anyone anymore.
Is this why the whispers of Sarah talk about "trust?" The whole basis of the island story could be summed up as the mental instability of Jack. He is the one who could never get over Sarah. She was the one he fixed, but he could not fix their relationship. When he tries to commit suicide, it is Sarah who appears before him - - - and he wants to be with her, but she refuses and leaves. Sarah is one of the elements in Jack's life that he cannot get over. Likewise, it is Christian's berating that Jack cannot make the hard decisions, the life and more importantly, the death decisions. As such, he can never be a leader. He can never be a good doctor. So in a way, the island and its plots could center around the mental issues (or character flaws) of Jack not being able to "get over" Sarah and "move on" with another woman and the fact that he cannot "save" every life; and at times he needs to "take" lives in order for others to live. It would be an agonizing dynamic in a tortured soul's mind to try to reconcile those deep rooted beliefs; but that is what Jack does at the End.
The characters now appear to be rats in a complex maze. When Michael attempts to set off the bomb on the freighter, it surprises Ben that he actually attempted it. So the bomb was rigged NOT to explode. Instead, Ben ordered Michael to get a “list” of crew, then disable the radio room and engines. Why? If the whole purpose is to “stop” the crew from getting to the island, why not stop them dead in the water by exploding the bomb? The only reason is that Ben “wants” the crew to arrive at the island; that he wants “them” to do the dirty work of killing everyone but his “chosen” people (meaning all the 815ers). But Ben will stumble over his own arrogance, because when he sets Alex off to safety, Karl and Rousseau are both killed, and Alex is captured by Keamy’s ship crew. In one respect, this incident fulfills a wish of Ben’s: to get rid of Alex’s boyfriend and her mother. But the consequences for that decision will be grave.
Magical/Supernatural/Elements:
The concept of “constants” and mental “time travel.”
The “whispers” are trapped souls left on the island.
The island “not allowing” Michael to commit suicide on at least two occasions, because Tom has Michael “has work to do” to save his friends still on the Island.
Last lines in episodes:
EP 77:
DESMOND: Aye. I'm perfect.
[Daniel is on the beach flipping through his journal. On a page, he sees: "If anything goes wrong, Desmond Hume will be MY constant."]
EP 78:
BEN: [cheerfully] See you guys at dinner.
[Ben marches into a house and shuts the door behind him, leaving Sawyer and Hurley dumbfounded.]
EP 79:
[Hurley and Sun are at a cemetery, Sun holding the baby. They approach Jin's tombstone. Sun kneels down, crying.]
SUN: [Subtitle: Jin... You were right. It's a girl. The delivery was hard on me... The doctor said I was calling out for you... I wish you could've been there. Jin... she's beautiful. Ji Yeon. I named her just like you wanted. I miss you so much. I miss you so much.]
EP 80:
ALEX: Wait! Wait! Don't! I'm Ben's daughter! I'm his daughter!
New Ideas/Tests of Theories:
In the last Reboot, we fully developed two “Unified Theories” to the Lost mythology to explain all of the factual and legal impossibilities in the actual Lost scripts. The Dream State theory postulates that the characters are alive in reality, but in a deep coma state where their minds have split in the dream world of the island and the fantasy world of the sideways realm. In the Egyptian After Life theory, the characters are already dead before the plane crash, and that their souls have been split between the underworld (island world) and the spirit world (sideways).
Using the science concepts of Minkowski and Faraday, one could extract a science-fiction basis for the island itself. It has been debated whether the Island is a character, a person or a place. If one combines Faraday’s electromagnetic physics with Minkowski’s theories of space-time, the Island can be seen as a unique “machine,” creating its own electromagnetic field a part from the Earth, which creates an opening portal, nexus or intersection into the four dimensions of space-time. This portal connection to space-time would allow an individual to go back into the past (to change events) or go forward into the future (to see the future events). The island’s power is one of a living time machine. Any person of wealth or stature would want to “control” the ability to control a time machine. One could make a fortune knowing the future, or changing the past. This may be the motivation for Widmore’s attempt to reclaim the Island from Ben and the Others. At the same time, this may be the motivation for Ben to keep people from coming and going from the island. It’s power must remain a captive secret so the island is not over-run by “miracle seekers.”
So what is the Island?
We know various story “facts” about the island. First, it appears to be a Pacific tropic island, believed to be located somewhere near Fiji. Second, based on the freighter rocket experiment, it is moving away at a fairly rapid speed. Third, based on the helicopter flights, it is difficult to get because there is only one “door way” inside the mask or cloaked atmosphere that surrounds the island itself. Fourth, the island contains “unique” electromagnetic properties. It appears that the Hatch was constructed after an “incident” to control the “discharge” of any electromagnetic build-up. Fifth, Faraday remarks that the island “scatters light” differently than normal. Sixth, we will learn later that the island contains a cave containing a “life force.” Seventh, there is speculation whether the smoke monster is mechanical, nanotech, spiritual or an organic beast.
Various theories have been postulated over the years.
One, is that the island is the bridge between earth and hell, a place of limbo where the dead or near-dead act out their last days before the after life journey begins.
Two, is that the island is actually hell, and souls incorporated into human form must journey through various dangerous but familiar “tests” to determine whether they are worthy of redemption and a fantasy life in heaven.
Three, is that the island is a fantasy game show, like the movie West World, but abandoned and taken over by evil spirits.
Four, is that the island is an alien space ship that has trapped people in its snow globe field to view humanity at its basic level.
Fifth, is that the island is merely a collective, networked dream of various characters who are in a state of coma or deep dreaming.
Sixth, is that the island is an alien time machine that has crash landed on earth, and the forces of good and evil are trying to control it.
Seventh, is that the island is ancient Atlantis, a highly advanced civilization that had mastered the elements and dimensions of time travel.
Eighth, is that the island is an ancient Egyptian portal to the underworld, created to help their pharaohs in the after life achieve great power and immortality.
Ninth, is that the island represents the subconscious of a troubled person, trapped in his or her own personal fantasy land.
Tenth, is that the island is a living being of supernatural powers, who uses human beings as pawns for his amusement.
Eleventh, is that the island is a prison for Satan, who is trapped by the electromagnetic fields created by messengers (angels) in order to “save the (human) world” from destruction.
Twelfth, is that the island is a quantum portal, a black hole in the fabric of the universe, that allows parallel universes (the multiverse theory) to come into contact with each other, either physically or mentally in time jumps.
Thirteen, is that the island is a metaphor for god, in how he gives people choices but allows their individual’s free will to guide their decision making to make their own choices; but with consequences for their actions, good or bad.
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