VoyForums
[ Show ]
Support VoyForums
[ Shrink ]
VoyForums Announcement: Programming and providing support for this service has been a labor of love since 1997. We are one of the few services online who values our users' privacy, and have never sold your information. We have even fought hard to defend your privacy in legal cases; however, we've done it with almost no financial support -- paying out of pocket to continue providing the service. Due to the issues imposed on us by advertisers, we also stopped hosting most ads on the forums many years ago. We hope you appreciate our efforts.

Show your support by donating any amount. (Note: We are still technically a for-profit company, so your contribution is not tax-deductible.) PayPal Acct: Feedback:

Donate to VoyForums (PayPal):

[ Login ] [ Contact Forum Admin ] [ Main index ] [ Search | Check update time | Archives: 1, 2, 3, 4, [5] ]

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Date Posted: Monday, August 20, 02:59:06am
Author: veggie
Author Host/IP: s89641-2.savvis-internet.uslsan3-bsn.savvis.net / 209.223.191.18
Subject: Wow - meaty.
In reply to: sparkle 's message, "So....what do we know so far? NO spoilers in here." on Friday, August 17, 09:48:16am

A quickie from Wikipedia and then my own babbling:
Wiki:
"In 1970 University of Michigan doctoral candidates Karen and Gerald de Groot founded the DHARMA Initiative with financial backing from the Hanso Foundation. DHARMA brought together "scientists and free thinkers" from around the globe at a "large-scale communal research compound" to conduct research in various disciplines, including meteorology, psychology, parapsychology, zoology, electromagnetism, and a sixth discipline that the film begins to identify as "utopian social . . . ." before being cut off. American psychologist and Walden Two author B.F. Skinner is cited as an influence on the de Groots' work.


Eventually all DHARMA Initiative employees stationed on the island had been "purged" by the "Hostiles" (the name given to the "Others" by the DHARMA Initiative), who were present on the island long before the Initiative arrived.[1] The Others killed those living in the DHARMA Initiative camp with deadly gas and took over many of DHARMA's stations and The Barracks."

So, basically, we know this - in the 70s, during the same era as EST, Bucky Fuller, and communes (utopianism being a common theme, along with "human potential"), a couple of grad students were funded by a wealthy idealist and created an experiement similar to the biodome experiments of the time, except on an island. The experiment became a complex network of well funded, well equipped "stations" with a staff both on a mainland and on the island. For some reason, Dharma at some point begins to hide its true intentions and uses trickery and abduction (Juliette, for example) to keep its projects going. Therefore, at some point, the utopian idealism gave way to a sort of "black ops" mindset, using coercian to keep its staff in line.

According to Wiki, another group was already on the island when Dharma arrived -- the "others" were there first. How did they come to be on the island BEFORE the Dharma Initiative? They seem to be non-native to the island - kinda white middle-class Americans for the most part.

Some kind of tension between the two groups arises, causing The Others to resort to massacre to either survive onslaughts from Dharma, or to gain the resources of Dharma. However, the work of Dharma seems to have somehow migrated over to The Others, particularly through Ben, who also uses trickery and coercian (sp) to manipulate and control. However, Ben keeps insisting he (and his minions) are "good guys" - is Ben using his power over the others to contain a bad situation from becoming worse? It's been hinted at, or it could just be Ben's delusion. Regardless, he wields tremendous power.

Ben seems to have a connection to Jacob that he jealousy protects, as we saw when he shot Locke when he thought Locke could communicate with Jacob. I personally think Jacob is either (a) Alvar Hanso OR (b) Magnus Hanso from the Black Rock ship OR (c) a human who exists in interdimensional space/time and became that way because of the island -- and THAT is the information that Ben protects and/or tries to contain from getting to the outside world.

Perhaps the power of the island would escape with the Losties and that is why Ben tries to keep them either trapped on the island or just outright eliminate them. Perhaps Jacob is a foretaste of what might happen to the whole world if the island's secrets (perhaps discovered accidently by Dharma during their time on the island) got off the island.

Or it could be that J.J. ate some bad mushrooms.

Thoughts?

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Replies:

[> Wow! Now I'm leaning towards the bad mushrooms! -- sparkle, Wednesday, August 22, 10:28:29am [1] (24-107-158-71.dhcp.stls.mo.charter.com/24.107.158.71)

I don't understand the Others reasons for the massacre. I love your theories though!


[ Edit | View ]


[ Contact Forum Admin ]

Forum timezone: GMT-5
VF Version: 3.00b, ConfDB:
Before posting please read our privacy policy.
VoyForums(tm) is a Free Service from Voyager Info-Systems.
Copyright © 1998-2019 Voyager Info-Systems. All Rights Reserved.