Philosophical Questions to Ponder

Some philosophy to ponder that is highly relevant to LOST:

1) Do you believe in a Deterministic universe? This essentially means the following: do you believe that future events are purely a product of the past...as if prior events are leading to an inevitable future? This can also apply to individuals. Does a human life "play out" according to one's childhood and life experiences, destined for future experiences created from past ones. In other words, are we so entrenched in who we already are that despite the best intentions, we will never really change?

-- or --

Do you believe that at any juncture, humans can employ "free will" and carry it through, persevere in altering their own path by decision/will power?

2) Another key idea comes into play with the question above. Is there such a thing as random chance? Is it true that sometimes some "variable" or "inexplicable random occurrence" enters in and alters the otherwise steady pattern of past to future? Some quantum physicists (but not all) ascribe to this idea. And it is what "shook" the world of classical physics.

- Or -

Does the universe always move along consistently from A to B to C to D, each event leading to the next and (this is a key scientific concept) could we determine the future if we had at our disposal every piece of information about the past? This is a Newtonian view of the universe.

3) if the world is, in fact, Deterministic (and just playing itself out logically and reductively), then "progress" is sort of a mute point, no?
--- and ----
4) if the world sometimes is impacted by pure random chance, that also destroys the concept of "progress."
Is Progress just a wishful human illusion?

It seems that wherever we stand on the above questions is instrumental in our individual theories about LOST.

You can have both free will and destiny work together. Free will in the present builds the path to the future. With this in mind you can argue that if our present is predetermined by the actions of the past, but just because things are guided a certain way does not make it predictable. Free will in the hands of one can do so much the entire world has to have a collective say in the direction we go to some degree. Our pasts do shape who we are and this can have any nuumber of ramifications. Take dreams for instance. In dreams you dont tell people who or what they are, they have a 'background' that makes them who they are. If life is but a dream then whose to say we are not pawns of the subconcious and everything you think you know about everything is a fabrication because we came into existence... now.
Time is a unit of measurement but is subjective to the person measuring its passing. Not sure if we can change what is happening unless we are a part of the event but i think you are assigning this to time travel if so then we must get into paradoxes and if a loop merely exists, at some point one must start going back to begin the cycle and once this occurs either they branch into an alternate timeline or they need to get another them to continue the cycle in the exact same manner, were their always two yous, is a paradox merely a term assigned to the unknowable since once it occurs it is constant for that time, the discovery of a paradox is impossible since you can not perceive it once it occurs, etc.
Through ecological evolution everything simply playing out would still be progress since it has the potential to go somewhere eventually unless stopped.
Progress i believe to be another subjective measurement since your not where you started but not quite where you want to be. Or this could be the wishful thinking you refered to.
Everything we hold dear definitely impacts our views on lost. On the old abc site i wrote a theory that our religious or evolutionary beliefs may hinder our theories on time travel. I even used three douglas adams (self ordained radical atheist) quotes and all i got was a bunch of people stating they dont believe in religion... it was kind of ironic like a poof of logic. Im agnostic so i dont really care either way. When i get all the answers i want it will be too late.
I think i answered everything. I read you are taking philosophy. I am dying to hear more about that.

Really great thoughts there! I'm going to reply to one or two, and come back to others later this evening.

I like your sense of questioning around solipsism. I agree that we simply cannot know for sure if we make up our entire experience. Naturally, when two solipsists discuss the concept, that sort of rules it out, lol...but that's the fun of paradox. You're right that in dreams it seems we encounter characters that are already "whole" - we don't need to invent them and weave details, those people already exist in our minds fully formed when they enter the dream. But do they?

Some people would argue that we "fill in" the details about those dream characters later, upon reflecting on the dream. Sort of like we make up (fill in) whatever we need in order to make the dream story move along as we are remembering it.

Also, re Determinism. Makes sense that you say it's both free will and predetermined. But there's another component to the Newtonian Determinism idea. If the events of the past are leading up to a particular outcome, it's likely that there are really several outcomes that would be possible. It's like a path in the forest leading to several different forks in the road - free will can cause us to take one fork over another, but there are only so many choices we have based on the road we came on.

In other words, free will itself might be limited or constricted by certain past events. You can change your potential destiny, but only in some ways. You can't walk along that path and then at some point, turn left and end up in China. The choices (the forks in the road) ARE determined by the past road. I tend to ascribe to that idea. That's also why I have trouble with the more mystical/extraordinary theories about LOST. I think it's only interesting and intelligent if there are Rules of logic that dictate...not just 'anything goes' in the name of free will.

More later, but fun discussion, no?

OH YES... i have never in my life met another who resides a solipsist.
"Naturally, when two solipsists discuss the concept, that sort of rules it out, lol...but that's the fun of paradox."
Technically I believe this is not my mind for i am but a figment of someone elses imagination hence the displacement of the solipsists beliefs... so we may be able to discuss without too much in the way of casualties.
on Newtonian Determinism idea, the only way things can come to a particular outcome would be to have knowledge of future events otherwise its a not so particular outcome its just an outcome. Besides that minute detail i agree 100%.