the blast door map

While we are waiting for Jan. 31, would you mind clearing up a few items? Is the code (4 8 15 16 23 42) an island thing or a Dharma thing? A central question was whether or not its hourly entry truly saved the world. Then Locke forced the answer. The sky turned purple. The hatch blew. The island shook. Somehow the conclusion was that the world was in fact saved with each code entry....yet the world was still turning throughout season 3. So I am confused on this score.

yes. there are a lot of details to remember about the code, the entering of the code, dharma and the code, saving the world, inman and desmond, inman and radzinsky.

let's start with the code. a general explanation of what the numbers are was given last year in-between seasons 2 and 3 as part of the 'lost experience.' the numbers are part of the 'valenzetti equation.' well, lostpedia explains it best. here's an excerpt:

these six numbers are the core values of the Valenzetti Equation, a mathematical formula designed to predict the end of humanity. The numbers in actuality are said to represent human and environmental factors in the equation (given numerical form), though their precise meaning is uncertain. The purpose of the DHARMA Initiative was to change the factors leading to humanity's demise

which is pretty much a non-explanation, as many things in lost are. it's also a little unclear just how canonical we are to accept information from the 'lost experience.' the numbers clearly go beyond dharma, though, as they were the winning lottery numbers for hurley (which he got from leonard, who got them from sam), it's clear that they're being established in the lost 'world' as mystical and 'beyond coincidence.'

but on to the end of the world stuff. i don't think we have enough evidence to conclude that 'the world would have ended.' we have to examine where that phrase came from. desmond says it first - he heard it from kelvin inman, who is told it by dharma. we still don't know the purpose of the hatch and what exactly entering the numbers did. we know that relieving the buildup of energy is part of what kept the island shielded from the outside world. it's entirely possible that 'saving the world' is merely dharma rhetoric for 'keeping our project safely hidden,' and that 'the end of the world' really means 'dharma gets shut down by osha.'

so what happens when the button isn't pressed? in an interview with jeff jensen (click tab above for more jeff), damon and carlton confirmed that desmond was directly responsible for crashing the plane by not pushing the button. so clearly some big stuff goes down when the electromagnetic energy gets too built up. would it have been the end of the world? ah, we'll never know because desmond turned the failsafe key at the last moment. for all we know, the world -could- have ended had he not done so in time. letting the clock run down made the ground shake, but it was turning the key that propelled desmond momentarily into the past (also conveniently stripped him naked), imploded the hatch, turned the sky purple, and exposed the island to the outside world.

another thing to keep in mind is the protection dharma itself placed around the entering of these numbers - they put completely isolated people in a separate station (the swan), and then they had people in a diferent station (the pearl) observe that station, and led the observers to believe that the activities in the swan station were inconsequential. it was designed so that maintenance of the button would occur at all times, but without anyone's knowledge of it's importance.

when desmond crashes on the island, he is saved by inman, who tells desmond that he volunteered for dharma - we know now that this does not make him one of the others. the nature of the station keeps inman (and radzinsky, his original partner) in the dark about goings on in the main dharma camp. though when you look at the timeline, inman must have come to the island after the purge. perhaps the hostiles kept up the illusion enough to recruit new people?

all this will be important later, when we learn just how much (or little) ben knew of what was happening in the swan station. after gassing all of dharma, he would know that dharma people were still in the swan station. he also much have known that the swan station was receiving food drops, and if activity in the swan station was interrupted, it would alert the outside world - so part of his plan in taking over dharme was to leave the swan station operating in isolation.

now here's something that i had forgotten - the orientation video, narrated by a one-armed dr. marvin candle, who makes reference to an 'incident,' and ever since this incident, it is now necessary to enter the numbers every 108 minutes.

we had better find out what that incident was. and what happened to marvin candle's arm.