I do realize that we don't know too much about time travel, and thus the Producers of LOST can basically make up their own time travel rules.......but did anyone else find it a bit weak that Miles could stare at himself as a baby with absolutely no catastrophic repercussions?

quote:

Originally posted by primetime52:
I do realize that we don't know too much about time travel, and thus the Producers of LOST can basically make up their own time travel rules.......but did anyone else find it a bit weak that Miles could stare at himself as a baby with absolutely no catastrophic repercussions?

Absolutely, especially given that Dr. Chang had previously freaked out about the possibilities of the two bunnies getting together.

Staring at himself - not that big of a deal. But what if the two Miles' touch? Could that be The Incident? A temporal concussion of some sort?

Yes, this has been the big "bust" I've been waiting for. While we could have implied in past episodes that a character has two lives at the same time, this is the first time a character has actually been in the frame in two separate bodies. While it breaks every science fiction rule in the book, as was said, Lost can and does make up their own rules.

And how did Miles and his mom end up off the island before the massacre of Dharmites? And off island with mom claiming that "dad" had abandoned them? Can it have some connection to Faraday arriving on the island? And, let me add, a Faraday looking very much like the modern Faraday, not a 70's version.

Simply said, I want to see what is "at the base of the statue". I'm thinking another temple. If that turns out to be just some code or recognition phrase I will be very disappointed.

The inherent paradoxes in time travel are precisely why I reject the possibility of time travel (at least to the past). No explanation makes sense to me; any attempt to circumvent the inherent paradox du jour is contrived. Since I have to suspend credibility anyway, whatever TPTB come up with is as "feasible" as anything anyone else comes up with.

If the process doesn't prevent you from traveling back to a time that you already exist, then why would it prevent Miles from babysitting himself?

Why would there be a some catastrophic result in meeting yourself? Do the laws of physics change when we travel back in time? Does our composition change in some way that would make one (or both) of Miles disintegrate upon touching each other?

If physical law permits us to travel back in time, why would phyical law prevent us from killing our grandfather before our father is born? Why would physical law be different for past me than it is for any one I encounter? For that matter, I should also be prevented from killing anyone else's grandfather. By merit of my time travel, my actions do not have the same consequences they would have if I did the same action in the present. It would seem that pregnancy in a trip to the past should also be prevented. Or carrying a child to term...that has interesting implications re: the island.

PageCarl: Now that we know there is a third faction (dubbed "The Statuaries" next door) it seems there is more than a recognition code in the question, "What lies in the shadow of the statue?" Who are these guys? I guess it has been established that the man behind Ilana when Ben shoots the man whose name I have already forgotten, is the same man who snatched Miles at the taco stand. And Rhys wonders if the man who ran to Lapidus on the beach yelling "They have guns" is the same guy who played the undercover cop when Locke was in the commune.

I wonder if it is Miles who will warn his father of the impending massacre which will result in what Miles was told was his father's abandonment of he and his mother. It fits that if Dr. Chang knew of the purge in advance that he would contrive a reason for sending his wife and child to safety. He couldn't send them stateside with a promise of following; he had to send them away with an explanation that would prevent his wife from insisting on staying with her husband and would also prevent his wife from coming to find him when he didn't join them later.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: undaunted,

So Dauntless, I guess we are to assume that the Miles snatcher, when he says that he is with the group who will win, is a part of the third group? There must be something else happening. Did these people end up on the island at the island's beckoning? It seems unlikely they could have already trekked to the statue. Thus, they were "programmed" before they got to the island. Was Mama Faraday's scientific decision about the Ajira flight a prediction within a prediction, not only letting the Losties back to the island but also getting the new bunch back? This new bunch seems more cultish than the rest. It will be interesting if they are further developed as a group.

I have to think that Faraday has something to do with events on the island. I just can't think of what, unless it has something to do with Jughead. The only other thing that makes sense is for Faraday to play a part in the development of the computer system which Desmond ends up keypunching. All in all, I see Faraday as playing a much larger role in the time sequencing on the island.

We know there is a massacre coming but we also know it is a ways away. All of these construction projects need to be finished. On top of that, the hatch needs not only be done, but it must be manned, operational, and enough time passed that Desmond can sail in and join he button pushing.

I'm seeing a bunch of thngs needing to converge fairly soon. A whole bunch of people need to get to a new place (or time) reasonably soon. Yet more and more are arriving by the minute. Want to bet that Claire shows up for the party? And remember that Widmore is still out there somewhere.

And Dauntless, I agree with your time travel discussion (whatever in the heck you said). In the end, if Miles killed baby Miles, grownup Miles would not exist. But, he would not exist in the future. He could in theory exist in the present and grow forward from that point. That is the theory of simultaneous paths of time and place all existing in the same moment, as opposed to more conventional linear time. If grown Miles killed baby Miles, and grown Miles somehow popped back to the future, he wouldn't exist.

For those "soap opera" fans, it is interesting that the writers have created such an obvious role reversal between Sawyer and Jack. Sawyer always felt himself a more capable decision-maker than Jack. Now Sawyer is discovering the challenges associated with being the responsible one. Like Jack and Kate, Sawyer is seeing his relationship with Juliet take a hit. And isn't Juliet becoming a much nicer person now that she is more matronly?

Okay, enough rambling.

Probably beating a dead horse, but ...

We've seen strong evidence that the writers have opted for the Novikov/"course correction" angle re backward time travel ... i.e., going back in time inherently involves making "local" changes to the world line, but these must be resolved by the point when the world line returns to the exact moment the backward time travel commenced.

This could even be extended to someone killing themselves in the past; e.g. if adult Miles killed baby Miles, then adult Miles could exist in "past time" up until the point when he traveled back in time ... but then must die. I would suggest this is why Ben was so sick in the infirmary while little Ben was shot and dying ... if little Ben had died, then adult future Ben would've died in the infirmary, such that he could not "exist" beyond the point when he traveled back in time. Kinda convoluted perhaps, but IMO, that's the angle the writers were going with (?).

I have no huge problem with that, but I do have trouble with the concept presented on the show of "touching" oneself in the past leading to disastrous results. If you can travel back in time to meet yourself, then touching yourself should be no different than "seeing" yourself ... after all, according to Heisenberg, just observing the system inherently disturbs it. So Miles seeing himself as a baby is just as significant as "changing his own diapers" or any other form of physical contact. If touching himself can induce some catastrophe, then simply seeing himself should as well.

Of course, they're playing very loosely with "the rules" of time travel on the show already, so ... I'm certainly not going to stress over that oversight! If touching oneself in the past somehow becomes important to the plot, I will not complain ... just thought I'd mention now that it's not very consistent with other theory presented (as much as any of it has shown consistency).

The whole Smokey/Anubis/whatever thing probably renders such discussion moot anyway, but that's my two cents on the time travel conundrum regardless.

quote:

Originally posted by undaunted:
The inherent paradoxes in time travel are precisely why I reject the possibility of time travel (at least to the past). No explanation makes sense to me; any attempt to circumvent the inherent paradox du jour is contrived. Since I have to suspend credibility anyway, whatever TPTB come up with is as "feasible" as anything anyone else comes up with.

If the process doesn't prevent you from traveling back to a time that you already exist, then why would it prevent Miles from babysitting himself?

Why would there be a some catastrophic result in meeting yourself? Do the laws of physics change when we travel back in time? Does our composition change in some way that would make one (or both) of Miles disintegrate upon touching each other?

I myself have a Tralfamadorian view of time: everything has always existed as it exists/will exist -- whatever happened, happened. Going back in time and interacting with yourself causes no problems whatsoever, since you always had been back there interacting with yourself.

quote:

If physical law permits us to travel back in time, why would phyical law prevent us from killing our grandfather before our father is born? Why would physical law be different for past me than it is for any one I encounter? For that matter, I should also be prevented from killing anyone else's grandfather.

You could kill your or anyone else's grandparent, but not until that person has already sired/conceived all the people they have always sired/conceived. You can't kill your grandfather before he sired your parent because you never did kill your grandfather before he sired your parent. Since it didn't happen, it can't happen. And we know it didn't happen because you exist.

This view of time can be disturbing because it raises some central questions about free will and fate (topics TPTB are certainly interested in). TPTB, if they agree with Ms. Hawking's view, don't subscribe to this view of time, though. They've latched on to the course correction view of time, which is much wobblier than the Tralfamadorian view. I have some thoughts about how that might play out in Lost, but I have to say that the course correction notion involves a lot more "machinery" and raises a lot more problems.

gnomon: I think the closest I can get to appreciating time travel is from the Tralfamadorian persepctive. My personal motto is, "So it goes."

ow, such a fun, interesting episode & I return from vacation to find hardly anyone discussing it hello & thanks to all my favorite die-hards (iI aalso have a dead computer, so this is going to be some really bad phone-typing.) nothing in sci-fi is constant iuntil it becomes sci fact the great Asimov himself locved to find loopholes in the 3 laws of robotics Now characters on Lost have said u can't change the past & Chang didnt want the rabbits near each other, but we don't have evidence yet that those would be failures. We HAVE seen that the island doesn't allow certain things. I can see that it wouldn't allow young Ben or Miles to die. That just conveniently fits the no-paradox rule that most stories follow. The was a Twilight. zone episode where a man went back to meet himself as a boy - and then remembered that it was when his adult self left without an explanation, he, as a cbild began to get in trouble. He didn't remember until he'd passed that time as an adult. So Desmond remembering Faraday doesn't bother me. Also, don't forget Heinlein's All You Zombies with sex changes & time travel allowing a person to impregnate & give birth to himself. Paradoxes are fun. But back to Lost - I don't think it's a problem for Miles to see himself, & I do think it's something about the island that gave him his powers.
I think I'm in the wrong thread for this bit but I can't flip windows to check. Travel off-island: we've seen Abaddon, Ben, Ethan & many others leave the island, apparently at will. It's not clear whether the "in crowd" needs to be sedated during transport, or it's only for sececy when they recruit. I suspecf the latter. But leaving & returning doesn't seem tof be a problem before the hatch blew. Except for Widmore, who was banished. I want to take back what I just said then, they all get sedated every time. But then who steers the sub? Is it on auto-pilot? Anyway, I'm sure Ethan got his medical training off-island. Wonder what college accepted his island transcript?