LT128: There Goes Peter Cottontail

PARADOX

A paradox is when you have conflict that may actually be true.

If you recall the leaked Comic Con video with the two #15 rabbits, then you know the good doctor was concerned about the two rabbits being near each other.

This lead one viewer to suggest that maybe Ben was transported to the desert, but that a copy of him stayed behind on the island. The part about “can never go back” would seem to compliment this idea.

However, it falls apart in that we aren’t likely to see Ben on the island when we return to Season 5. My bet is that the one - and only Ben - was sent to Tunisia. We have already had that fact confirmed when he killed a couple of guys, checked into a hotel and tracked down Sayid and the other Oceanic 6. While a copy COULD still exist on the island, we would have to put him into that ghost category. Then would that mean he would become part of the Whispering Group?

One theory is that the rabbits could not touch each other without something bad happening. However, they can share the same room as we witnessed. Unless something went bad and I missed it. For example, what if a black-hole-like-bad-thing did get created with two #15 rabbits in the room. And what if that black hole thing transported Dr. Candle’s/Halliwax’s left arm into the future. That would explain his false arm we see later. But then that means his left arm suddenly shows up in another time and place and that can lead to people being surprised, “Is that your leg?”

None of these ideas seem to fit all the time traveling clues we have been given.


YOU SILLY RABBIT

Our rabbit paradox is that we have two #15 rabbits. That just don’t seem right. A paradox though means that it is true! So-o-o-o-o…there ARE two #15 rabbits?

Maybe not. Consider Ayn Rand’s (author of the book “Atlas Shrugged” and indirectly referenced on the show) advice for contradictions. She says to recheck our premise, one of them is wrong.

The premise is that we have two #15 rabbits. We can correct the contradiction by stating that while we have two #15 rabbits, they are not the same rabbit.

This then removes the concept of parallel universes. It kills off the idea that we have 1,000 Jack’s and Locke’s in 1,000 different universes…the only difference being time. Instead, we have CLONES of Jack and Locke. We are left with copies instead of “multiple originals”.


DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE

The producers attempt to assist us by stating for the record that they are “paradox adverse”. They go on to point out that noting a character does in the past can change what we have already seen as the present or future. This is in stark contrast to the concepts in the movie, “Back to the Future”, where Marty could change events he already lived once.

It also contracts with the TV show, “Heroes”. That show says its characters can also travel backward in time, but they can change already lived events. Not so with LOST.

This means that the flash forwards we have seen can not and will not change due to some time travel back in time (either physical or mental). It also means we won’t see a Jack pop up somewhere and it not be the Jack we know and love.

Now this is all strange because it appears in flashbacks, Desmond most definitely has a different experience then when he first lived it – whether he buys the ring or not.

Let’s think this through.

Loop One: Desmond doesn’t buy the ring, he breaks up with Penny and he crashes on island
Loop Two: Desmond DOES buy the ring, he breaks up with Penny and he crashes on island

This is what the producers are telling us. Now what if Loop Two went like this:

Loop Two: Desmond DOES by the ring

Yeah, that’s all he does. What this implies is that Desmond is visiting history but so what because it doesn’t matter. Say he remembers the score from that soccer game in the bar and goes back and bets a bundle on the winner. When is returns, he is still poor as he is now.
It is just a visit in time…not much different then daydreaming about past “what if’s” or even a dream. Oh, he really goes back (mentally only as far as Desmond goes), but it really is just a walk down memory lane. Nothing more and nothing less.

The producers finish their clarification by pointing us to Mrs. Hawking (the jewelry store clerk).


HARE TODAY, GONE TOMORROW

To review…Mrs. Hawking knew Desmond’s name and tried to stop him from buying the ring this time. This strongly suggests that forces exist even when re-visiting the past to keep you from altering history. Oh, it is your dream, but even the dream police want you to replay the past the way it was first experienced.

Mrs. Hawking’s explanation begins by pointing out a man wearing bold red shoes. Moments later he dies and Desmond realizes this crazy lady KNEW it was going to happen. She confirms that she knew. Desmond asks why she didn’t stop it and her response is:

“Because it wouldn't matter. Had I warned him about the scaffolding tomorrow he'd be hit by a taxi. If I warned him about the taxi, he'd fall in the shower and break his neck. The universe, unfortunately, has a way of course correcting. That man was supposed to die. That was his path just as it's your path to go to the island. You don't do it because you choose to, Desmond. You do it because you're supposed to.”

Now this reinforces the producers claim that you can’t change the future by visiting the past. Notice that she throws free will out the window. Let’s face it, free will and religion are two doctrines attached at the hip! She instead proposes that “fate” is the reason things happen and like a scientific fact, you can’t change things just by wishing they were different.

Doesn’t point to the conclusion that Fate/Science triumphs over Faith/Religion?


HIPPITY HOP

How then can we reconcile what we see in the #15 bunny video with the rules of time that Mrs. Hawking explains?

It leads us back to duplicates or clones. It is the same DNA, but very different people. Instead of thinking “Back to the Future” we should think “Pet Cemetery”. In that film after the boy died he came back a mirror image of himself. The more I think about it the more this film does apply.

The idea is that death is the singularity of each “side” of a person. The resurrected boy in Pet Cemetery was in essence anti-matter. Does this mean that after Ben transported he too is now anti-matter? This might also explain his banishment from the island explained by the high exposure to whatever gets released when the Wheel turns…or when you turn a Fail Safe key in the tunnels under a hatch.

CONCLUSION

I just polished off my six-pack and I still don’t have a clue what is going on. LOL!

If you enjoy this post, please click on an ad in the upper-right hand corner on your way out. This also helps be steer content in the direction of those kinds of posts you like. Thanks so much and keep reading!


Enjoy,
KC

LT127: Wheels, What-If and Whispers

TIME MACHINE THEORY



If that doesn’t remind you of Back to the Future’s flux capacitor…we saw this in the Orchid hatch. The idea is that Dharma had learned to skip around time and probably used animals. We see the polar bear in the desert and the #15 rabbit in the leaked video.

There are schools of thought out there that are a couple of ways to control the time jumps – one with the machine and the other with the Dharma wheel.

Eventually, Dharma begins to use real human test subjects. Perhaps they didn’t intend to, but another research project – probably involving some virus – goes wrong and infect some of the Dharma scientists. With little prospect of a future, the infected most likely volunteer to go back in time. My theory is that they are cured because “back then” they weren’t sick…yet.

One important rule concerning this stuff is that one can never travel back further than when the Time Machine was first invented – probably the 1960’s or so. Maybe it was around the time Locke was born. Hmmm….


JEREMY BENTHAM

The producers have said the obit for Mr. Bentham was only a prop. However, it did include his name and it did detail how he died – both facts confirmed on the show So, I re-read Locke’s/Bentham’s obit and it states he has one surviving son.


SUMMER GAME UPDATE

The most common word used is “anti-climatic”. We are on Test #4 and other than a few hidden messages in the web pages, we don’t have really know where this is going. How is that any different than the TV show?

The last clue in Test #4 was “Mittlewerk” as in Thomas Mittlewerk, our friend from the Lost Experience game. Ok, he’s no friend of mine and is the new head of the Hanso Foundation.


APOLLO CANDY BARS

These chocolate delights have been seen on a BBC show called Primeval. Man, people don’t miss much out there.


WHISPERS FROM IZI

In case you missed the posted comment, Izi (a fan of Lost Tidbits and fellow blogger), writes to say he has some ideas on the Whispers. You can find his analysis here: http://ncjl.wordpress.com/current-theories/the-whispers/

Thanks for the link, Izi.

Enjoy,
KC

LT126: We Wouldn’t Be Lost If We Had The Answers

TUNISIA

Why all the references to Tunisia? This is the place where Ben is transported after turning the Dharma Wheel.

It is also the place where Charlotte finds her polar bear with a Dharma collar.

This country is also used by George Lucas in Star Wars.

The drug smuggler’s had a map of the desert area of Tunisia.

And the X-Files ended its run in Tunisia at a testing lab that worked with viral experiments.

Finally, the direct polar (bear) opposite of Tunisia would put one in the South Pacific just east of Australia.

I tried to find something sinister about the country and came up empty.


PHOTO FRAMES

If you recall when Miles was first introduced he was entering a home to rid it of some ghost. We see Miles walking up the stairs and then down the stairs. On the wall along the stairs are pictures. Why do the frames change from wood to metallic?

Some people claim the photos remind them of a young Eko. Would Yemi be there too or was he still too young to even be born yet?

Besides the picture frames we can see a lottery ticket for $15 hanging on the wall alongside a football jersey with the number 15.

And some people claim that they have seen this boys picture in Ben’s house on the island.


WHISPERS

The Whispers are one of the longest running and most common feature that falls into the category of strange…and yet has had very little explanation about them. Even the Survivors don’t seem to ask each other or Ben about them.

The consensus is that the Whispers are the Others speaking to each other with some Jedi mind trick. There is even some support to that theory by the producers. But to confuse matters, the producers came out later and said, “No, they are something else.”

What could they be?

Let’s admit it, we overlook these Whispers way too much. Think about how much time the producers spend getting actors to say lines in three different audio channels, mix them, edit them to avoid giving away clues…and then both to mask them so that only super-duper equipment can barely understand them?

What we think we hear leads us to people other than the Others. For example, it appears that Boone says “Hi, sis” and he isn’t another. Boone and Shannon are dead, so maybe we should listen for Danielle and Alex to have a conversation. Several have suggested we are hearing the dead, or parallel universes overlapping, or whatever.

Do notice that in many cases the Whispers are accompanied by rain and soon followed by Others showing up.


JACOB

Why won’t Jacob talk to Richard?

Some people are suggesting this deals with succession. Richard may have had fellowship with Jacob at one time. Richard may have been the one to bring Ben to the cabin for his first visit.

Recall that when Ben brought John, that Ben could hear and see Jacob…but now it seems that Ben is blind to Jacob. Is this just another passing of the baton to the next generation? If so, what would this imply?

To confuse things, we then see Jacob using Christian (and Claire?) as his spokespeople.

Don’t you start to get the feeling that we are seeing what we want to see? Or what is convenient to see? Like a monster who can project a human shape, but takes on human form in order to be accepted. That makes me wonder what Jacob really looks like. Eew!

One poster points out that Jacob looks like Christian because it would freak John out if he walked into the cabin and saw himself. Hmmm….


TENNIS SHOES

The producers have told us to pay attention to what Christian was wearing on his feet. We have several scenes where we see white tennis shoes.

Then remember that in the Pilot episode we have Jack running past a tennis shoe dangling from its laces on a tree branch.

In Missing Pieces clip we see Jack in his funeral garb except we can assume he should be wearing a nice pair of black dress shoes instead of white gym shoes.

Then consider John was talking to Jack about his visions (indirectly) when he asked Jack, “Yeah, but what if you saw was real?”

This show makes you think, then rethink everything we’ve seen. And maybe that is the message of this show…to think. To re-examine everything we think we know about our environment, our selves, and our world. Cool and creepy at the same time!

Enjoy,

KC

LT125: LOST REDUX

LOST IN 2.0

There is a website that advertises “Lost in 2.0”. It describes it as an on-line rerun of the series with extra bonuses from those on-screen dialogs to interviews with key players. This might be a good way to pass the time until LOST Season 5 starts.

http://www.g4tv.com/lost/splash.aspx

It begins in about eight days.


FLASHBACK: ADAM and EVE

You recall our two skeletons in the caves, right? Someone noticed they seem to be wearing parachutes.

Look closely (you can click on them to enlarge for better viewing). You can make out the straps over the shoulders as well as other pieces.

What does this imply? Perhaps they had to bail out of an aircraft like Naomi. Or a hot air balloon.

Jack estimated they deaths to be about fifty years ago, or 1954. We also know the Black Rock crashed on the island in 1845. 1845 + 108 = 1954.

If we continue this line of thought we can project that the storyline of LOST is 108 days. And the Bible tells us that to God a thousand years is as a day, especially when you have jumping islands.


EMMY TIME

It seems as if we have five nominees for Best Drama including LOST. Each nomination sends in five episodes. One episode is sent to each judge randomly, who then views the five nominees episode they received before judging. LOST is putting these five up for viewing:

The Beginning of the End
The Constant
Ji Yeon
There’s No Place Like Home, Part 1
There’s No Place Like Home, Parts 2 and 3

Seems like they sort of cheated on that last entry! I’d pretty much agree that those are some of the five best episodes of last season.


TRIVIA TIME

Eight drugs have been mentioned on LOST, but can you name them?

You might have correctly guessed alcohol as one of the drugs. What you might not know is that the actors playing Libby and Ana Lucia were arrested for drunk driving while filming LOST and both arrests were within 15 minutes of each other.

You might have correctly guessed cigarettes as one of the drugs. What you might not know is that one of the brands seen is called Portsmouth. There is no real-life Portsmouth brand. It was the name on the side of the Black Rock as its port of origin. And it is the hometown of Charles Dickens.

You might have correctly guessed heroin as it was Charlie’s favorite drug. What you might not know is that Charlie is never seen directly taking the drug…only veiled references. And they use brown sugar as the drug when shooting.

You might have correctly guessed the vaccines. What you might not know is that there is no known vaccine drug treatment that requires daily injection for years.

You might have correctly guessed Juliet’s test drug. What you might not know is that she was giving it to her sister Rachel. Or maybe you did know that one.

You might have correctly guessed Locke’s drug. What you might not know is on the show, his paste is actually chocolate pudding.

You might have guessed Oxycodone. What you might not know is refills for Schedule 2 drugs do not permit refills. This was Jack’s drug.

You might have guessed Clonazepam. What you might not know is using it too often will cause memory loss. And Jack and Hurley were the users of this drug.

Enjoy,

KC

LT124: Passing Thoughts

WHY DIDN’T SMOKEY KILL KEAMY?

We have noticed how Keamy seemed to be pretty well prepared for what he was about to find on the island. He could have then come prepared. Perhaps he had a miniature sonar force field like the fence that encompassed Othersville. Or maybe he had some other possession that kept him save…like, oh…maybe a black and white rock?


ALMIGHTY BRUCE GERNON

If you haven’t heard of Bruce Gernon before now, it might be worth a search on the Internet. He is the person who claims to have flown a distance in 45 minutes that normally takes 75 minutes. This flight was anything but a normal straight-line to make the time even more surprising for he had to dodge storm clouds along the route.

It seems as if he runs into special clouds that behave unlike what he had witnessed before. They would change shape rapidly for a cloud. Tunnel would form within the cloud. At times, the unusual shaped clouds could be found in pairs – with his little prop-plane in the middle.

He reports heavy electromagnetic fields that rendered his equipment useless. He observed several changes in the light in what he describes as “shades of grey” or “greens like an electronic fog”. The most odd of all reported observations was that the fog would form and seem to attach itself to an object – his plane.

NOTE: Pick up the short story by Stephen King called “The Mist” and read his description of his fog. It is the best description of what Gernon was talking about. Yeah, this is the one made into the movie and I never saw it. But a book is always better at describing something. In short, it “moved oddly”.

I’m sharing this because someone recently suggested that the storyline of LOST is borrowing heavily from this guy’s account.


GAME UPDATE

The Project Game this summer is moving into Test 3. It will remind the older members of the audience of Asteroids as you have to avoid being hit for 100 seconds. The longer you avoid the asteroids, the faster they move.

Like earlier tests, there are always cheats. In this test you can right-click to pause which can come in handy. The Geek Squad found some letters and numbers and plugged them into an anagram machine. They ended up with some musical notation of the musical term “lento”. The term means “music in a slow tempo”. Of course, typing that word in during Asteroid Attack slows the rocks speed down. Are they moving slower or is the timer moving slower? Hmmm…

We also got a little warning from Octagon Recruiting about a hacker named Black Swan.


TRIVIA TIME

Each blog I’ll try to come up with a piece of trivia that 99% will read and think, “I didn’t know that.” And of course, it should be LOST related. Like this one:

Kevin Tighe is the actor who played Anthony Cooper on LOST. Cooper is John Locke’s father.

That you knew, but did you know…

Kevin Tighe guest starred on Law and Order and played a character also named Cooper?


Enjoy,
KC

LT123: The World is Folding

DHARMA INITIATIVE UPDATE

We are on the second test for recruits. The tests are timed-based, of course, so the faster connections have a better chance of scoring. Players can also earn bonus points for recruiting other people to the site.

An interesting discovery is that letters appeared on the site that seemed to be a glitch. However, after enough letters were shown one could come up with an anagram that said, “I am on the inside”. Wonder what that means?


PRELIMINARY SCREENING

When the summer game began, applicants were asked a series of questions such as, “You see a tortoise lying on its back, struggling, and you're not helping -- why is that?"

This might ring a bell if you are fan of the movie “Blade Runner”. In the movie, a device called the Voight-Kampoff Machine, is a device where people are asked a series of questions. The claim is that with enough questions a person can be determined to be a replicant or human.

One of the questions in the movie is “You're in the desert, you see a tortoise lying on its back, struggling, and you're not helping -- why is that?"

The connection is there between movie and LOST. It goes one step further in that the movie says that within 20-30 questions the determination of replicant can be made. However, a replicant name Rachael takes over 100 questions to make the discovery. Rachael is the name of main character in the LOST summer game, The Lost Experience.

The same question also shows up in an episode of Stargate and the movie, 6th Day.

The author of the book which is the origin of Blade Runner is Philip K. Dick. The sci-fi writer is known for several books-to-movies including Total Recall, Minority Report, Next, Imposter, Paycheck, and Scanner Darkly.

Why would Dharma Recruiting be using a Voight-Kampoff Machine questions?


GOT ORIGAMI

Invites to Dharma Recruiting at Comic Con where given some fliers that included on the back some instructions on how to do origami. The shape when completed was that of a swan. This particular design was done by a physicist named David Bohm. He was a pioneer in thought control and author. His book, The Holographic Universe, discusses a model of the universe that deals with infolding and enfolding space – very LOST-related. A little more digging into David Bohm might be worthwhile.


Enjoy,
KC