Time police, simple question

[duffman]

I have posted this on a few boards but never got a response that has satisfied me, can any of you help?

If fate is predetermined, and destiny is an unchangable path as is the definition, then why do you need 'time police' characters like Miss Hawking to 'course correct' people when they are making decisions regarding there future? Surely this only proves that destiny can be changed, else why would they be there?

Although personally I do believe whatever happened, happened. Perhaps Desmond is the only one who can alter his timeline?

I need rational and healthy debate to satisfy my tiny, confused mind....anyone?

[spinaltumor]

I don't Hawking or anyone else are necessary at all to be "time police."

...Except when it comes to Desmond. He's special. His actions are NOT predestined. And so therefore he needed to be properly influenced by Eloise so that he would come to the Island and things would play out as she felt they were needed to.

Destiny can't be changed. Unless Desmond is behind it.

[guanthwei]

If I were Desmond and I found out I was the only one in the universe that can change destiny the way I saw fit... I'd sure as hell be using that power to utterly destroy my enemies' lives before they can have an effect on mine.

[spinaltumor]

Desmond's more a laid-back, just wants to live a simple life on a boat with his gal and son kind of guy.

[guanthwei]

I'd hate to see how Desmond's life would be if he never had that power...

[lost518]

Maybe the time police just monitor situations for course correction.

I have to say that I think that they did change things but I also believed whatever happened happened.

Maybe things did change and we will see the LOSTIES in a different situation or different people now than when 815 crashed but their destiny is to always go to the island. So no matter what they change their situations to their fate is the island.


Maybe Jacob and Nemsis are muniplating things for their own favor.

The philosopher Jeremy Bentham came up with a type of prison called a paocpticon and the idea was to abserve all prisoners without the prisoners being able to tell whether they are being watched, thereby conveying the sentiment of an invisble omniscience. Could the fact that Des is aware that he can mentally travel through time now make him the exception.

[markedman]

I had a theory a while back that still may apply. It takes the following as its starting point: Mrs. Hawking never said you can't change events, she just said that if you do change them, time will eventually course correct. So Desmond saves Charlies life, and Charlie really does live longer and gets to have conversations with Claire and write lists and so forth, but eventually he dies anyway. And I would imagine all the other actions that he took when he was "wrongly" alive will eventually correct out too, so they don't cause any permanent changes.

Another way of looking at this is that you can drop a rock in a river and it causes a brief disturbance in the flow, but the current quickly recovers and a moment later it is as if it never happened.

So maybe Esau and Jacob are locked in some epic battle to change time, only Esau has given up and wants Jacob to give up too. Esau says "It always ends the same way" but Jacob says "Everything up to that is progress". The Time Police work for one or the other.

There's a bit more to the theory. Perhaps the island is a self contained time loop. It follows different rules, because it doesn't interact with our universe. But the FDW creates a way to bridge the two universes. And that lets out all the chaos.

[spinaltumor]

Jul 31, 2009 12:41:24 GMT -5 markedman said:

Mrs. Hawking never said you can't change events, she just said that if you do change them, time will eventually course correct.

So if the Incident did prevent the plane crash, then we'll just get to see Boone, Shannon, Charlie, Ana, Libby, etc all die AGAIN!

D':>

[jacksloststepkid]

Yeah - I'm kind of in the same boat as marked man.

I think there are some rigid rules that are driving the timeline to try and be a certain way, but there are small things that can be done to do slight course corrections, like Desmond did to finally get the helicopter to the island and get off. That whole sequence of events he caused with his time precognition ended up in moving the island and all the time travel stuff happening.

I do think that some of the islands properties allow it to be unique somewhat outside of the normal timeline, such that it is the only place where these small adjustments to the normal course of time can happen.

If you look at the whole explanation of why DHARMA was really on the island and what the Valenzetti equation was, it was all about trying to change the future through messing with a set of variables that might allow humanity to avoid destruction. Doing something that they hoped would change the time line outside the island.

So, given this there are a couple ways I'm seeing this maybe going


1. repeating time loop theory - that there is this recurring set of events that are happening over and over. with the losties crashing on the island, eventually going back in time, etc. Maybe something small changes each time, so that instead of an exact repetition, there are slight changes happening, that one of the changes will allow something big enough to happen to break the loop of what is happening. It occurred to me that Desmond's diary might be tied to this, that maybe, like the compass it seems to be going through the loop over and over, with more information being added into it each time. Maybe this is the catalyst for enough change to happen. Each time around Faraday gets a bit more information to eventually guide the loop to be broken?

2. Another version of this doesn't include a repeating loop, but just a single one, with Desmond's foresight allowing the losties the chance to change where things were going in the normal timeline enough to actually avoid some bad direction the future was going.

I kind of like #1 for a lot of reasons.

First it explains Hawkings comments some - if she is one of a number of people that are somehow able to either remember their past memories each time the loop happens, or maybe somehow sit outside of the way that the time loop even happens, it would explain how they know so much. It also explains why Hawkings says to Penny that for the first time in a long time she doesn't know what is going to happen next. Something happened new, that has changed the timeline enough such that things are now finally new, broken out of the rut - the ongoing time loop that was happening.

Second, it explains maybe some of the other mysteries of the island - what if the whispers are all tied to leaks from the previous time loops, of the thoughts of those who were in that spot in time in a previous loop. Maybe the smoke monster is somehow tied into this - who knows.

Finally it kind of takes on a storyline somewhat similar to the Dark Tower series, Steven Kings primary masterpiece - a big influencer to the writers of the show.

JLSK

[thewootinater]

I agree JLSK. If you have never read Stephen King's The Dark Tower, STOP READING, SPOILERS!

SPOILER: Click to show

Once Roland finally gets to the top of the Tower, he opens the door and realizes as soon as he opens it that he has done this entire journey many, many times. He lands where the series begins, without remembering what had happened the time before. But something is different this time: he has the Horn of Eld, a valuable keepsake from his home, Gilead. This signifies that maybe this time it WILL be different for Roland.

I think this will be similar to Lost; they will never remember their previous loops, but soon enough, enough has changed that maybe they can break this loop. Maybe exploding Jughead was their Horn of Eld?

[danthew]

If they are time-police then there must be some time-crime.

[guanthwei]

Time Crime: The Others killing the military hydrogen bomb team in 1954.

[cindy]

I'm with markedman - any changes most people would make would be like dropping the proverbial rock in the river. My thought also is that any "time police" would be around in the event of some random and extraordinary person not be governed by destiny would do something to change the course of destiny just like dropping a boulder in the river and re-routing it.

PS - I also agree with JLSK, but I can't bend my mind into the same kind of multi-dimentional pretzel thing he has going on to explain things the way he does. I'll just stick with the simple stuff.

[tomfromminnesota]

Another possibility is that though Hawking and others are time police, they themselves are also limited in their knowledge of the overall big destiny. They're doing what they've been told to do according to the yet defined "rules", i.e., defined for us the audience. Everyone is playing a role with some apparently exercising more freedom than others, some with higher, broader perspectives, while some have very limited grasps of even a small part of the picture, pawns. Put another way, Hawking believes that the universe works a certain way, but with Desmond in the picture, she concedes that she only knows part of the total picture, ultimately--one that may include not just Desmond's actions and the effects they cause, but also the time police themselves. Hawkings and co may not have permission to participate in the game at this level, but simply must do what they're told, kind of like the situation with the Pearl and Swan stations. Why all the reports when we know that all that happens to them is that they're spit out a pneumatic tube into a heap on the ground? Only the designers know the final purpose and plan.

[markedman]

My impression of Hawking is that she has dedicated here life to making sure that whatever Faraday has written in his journal will come true. She views this as the only way to undo history and stop herself from shooting her son.