'Lost': Cause and effect, Part One
"Lost" has
always involved philosophy as part of its complex package. From the
use of various names of philosophers in the naming of its characters
to the fundamental problems faced by everyone it its universe, the
show has constantly striven to provide a philosophical underpinning
to its fantastical world. But in dealing with the repercussions of
Sayid shooting Ben, it's forced the audience more than ever to
confront the problems faced by the fictional characters they have
followed for five seasons.
In essence, the show is all but
breaking down the fourth wall to ask the audience: "What would YOU do?" The playful
interplay between Miles and Hurley is undoubtedly a prescient take on
Darlton's part to anticipate the various questions we would
have upon seeing Young Ben amidst his future antagonists, but it's
the way in which Jack, Juliet, Kate and Sawyer deal with Ben's
life-threatening condition that forces us to put us in their
footsteps. Forget about asking yourself about what you would do if
you found yourself on an Island with a smoke monster; ask instead if
you would save the life of someone you thought could cause
unspeakable harm later in life.
I use "could"
intentionally, because the four are acting in an air of relative
uncertainty. When they signed up to return to the Island, the Oceanic
6 did not know they would end up in 1977 living alongside a younger
version of their nemesis. Had they known, then the philosophical
inquiry would have taken place in modern-day Los Angeles, deep in the
bowels of a church hiding a Dharma station.
The question is
NOT, "Should we go back and kill this man before he can do any
harm?" For one thing, the ability to even do so is in question
thanks to Faraday's beliefs about causality and Hawking's assertion of course correction. Secondly, I doubt
any of the 06 would have preemptively agreed to such a plan, even without Ben there
to stare slack-jawed as they argued the merits of killing his younger
self. What we're dealing with post-Sayid's attack are people coming to grips
with an action they couldn't have predicted that fashions a
future that is far from clear.
It's one thing to say
"whatever happened, happened." It's quite another
to say "whatever will happen, will happen." The former
assumes a universe in which certain elements are
irrefutable/unchangeable. The latter assumes there's an
invisible hand up all our posteriors, denying us both will and
responsibility. I don't buy that's what's going on,
which is why I'm less worried about "fate" as a
guiding principle in the "Lost" universe than critics
that state that nothing that happens anymore matters due to its being
predestined to happen.
What's playing out is not some
sort of puppet theatre, but the series of choices made by people at
certain times that led to a particular outcome. It's the choice
that matters in the "Lost" universe, and if you want to
assign some master plan to an individual, assume said architect
selected people with certain dispositions, psychological makeup, and
yes, philosophical outlook. If you put those people into a specific social scenario,
you might have a good chance of decently predicting how they will
act. But you can't actually MAKE them do anything.
Let's
take an example from my life. I met my wife back in 2003. I met her
at a housewarming party in Manhattan; I happened to be living in
Boston at the time. So the popular, romantic notion is for people to
say, "Well, if you hadn't gone to that party, you never
would have met, and you never would have gotten married." Which
is not only extremely dumb, but also completely ignores the work put
into this relationship afterwards. As if the work of this
relationship was somehow locked down by some cosmic force making my
friend move during that month while pushing me onto a Greyhound Bus
while kicking her out of the door that night instead of staying in.
As Aristotle once said, "As IF!"
One can look at
our life now as the inevitable course of action, or as a series of
discreet decisions that led to this point simply because we MADE all
of those decisions. If you view it as the former, than we weren't
actually involved in our lives. We just coasted along the ebbs and
flows of Father Fate. Or, you're Jack right now, waiting idly
for the Island to do its thing while Ben bleeds. If you view it as
the latter, then you see Kate and Juliet's desire to save Ben
not as a part in some cosmic screenplay but making a choice based on
personal morality.
Further complicating this choice? The
parties involved are not guaranteed that either of their options will
actually have the desired outcome. Tomorrow, I'll look at the
affect of this choice made by the "Lost" leading ladies,
abetted by Sawyer. Are either Faraday or Hawking's theories
infallible? How much wiggle room does the time/space continuum allow?
Is change not only possible, but inevitable from here on in? We'll
discuss more in detail in the next entry.
Ryan also posts every 108 minutes over at Boob Tube Dude. He invites you to join the hundreds already in Zap2It's Guide to Lost Facebook group. He also encourages you to subscribe to the Zap2It's Guide to Lost Twitter feed.
Oh... what?
Fate vs. free will is probably one of the biggest philosophical arguments there is. One of the reasons I like LOST so much is that it's not afraid to go after these things. Sure, it's in the context of time travel, but a lot of the underlying arguments are meaningful in real life as well.
The essential paradox, of course, is this: If what happens in the future is known, what does that knowledge mean for our free will in the present? Does it mean that we don't have the ability to make choices? Or does it just mean that those choices were already accounted for?
There are a million ways to answer those questions... and so far I'm liking the way they're answering them in the context of LOST. A lot of shows really drop the ball on this subject, in my opinion; if they even address it at all.
I go with free will, rather than fate. I mean, if Elvis had known he was going to die whilst straining on the crapper (fate), would he have taken all those damn drugs that made him mega-constipated (free will)? I think not.
It's why I don't subscribe to the "what happened, happened" theory. If the Losties end up in 1977, knowing how things end up 30 years down the road, most of them would probably opt to do nothing, for who's to say whether their action or inaction is what causes Ben Linus to turn into Malus Overlordus Supremus?
Relaying on or believing totally in fate is silly, anyway. As Han Solo says, "There's no mystical energy field that controls my destiny." Or some such. Do what you do. If it's fate, it doesn't matter. If it's free will, at least you made the choice, and not some nebulous metaphysical theory some ancient Greek thought up whilst getting a back-rub in the bath.
As with most of my posts, with this and other screen names, folks have the option of reading them or ignoring them. That's free will. Then again, it may be fated that some people will be ignored in favor of others. Then again, again, free will can sometimes seem to be fate. B-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b...
And now you know why many imaginative people are also alcoholics. :P
I have never been a determinist, and therefore I have always believed in free will and that your life is a consequence of the decisions you make. The exemple you gave, Ryan, is just one among many that can be given in this discussion.
My question to everyone who claims to be a determinist is this: Why do you look both ways before you cross the road? If your theory is correct, your "fate" is already pre-decided before you cross, so it doesn't matter if you stop or look before taking that course of action.
Love the post. I teach drama, so this comes up in discussions quite a bit -- esp when we're covering Greek tragedy . . . Oedipus, for instance (or C***andra's role in Agamemnon) or the great contemporary play "Wit." The trick is determining what we can control and what we can't. We can't control the consquences of our actions or other people, but we do have a choice about what actions we take. Jack's going to have to live with the consequences of what he's done -- not just in terms of what Ben does or doesn't do in the future -- but in terms of what Jack's actions (or lack thereof) do to his own soul. (I mean, good grief, the guy's completely bailed on his Hippocratic oath.)
Anyhoo, cool discussion. I'm sure there will be plenty of disagreement -- glad everyone is so civil -- makes this much more fun. I look forward to the next post.
I'm still trying to figure out Sayid's motivations. . . did he at any point intend to save Ben? Or, was he giving young Ben a piece of his own (manipulative) medicine?
I think Sayid just doesn't understand the temporal mechanics at play here. He believes he CAN change the past, and that his purpose in being there is to do so. He said he knew why he was there and he acted on that conviction. The irony, of course, is that he was right; just not in the way he intended.
For my part, as to the free will vs. destiny paradox, I tend to think that both sides are true --- from a certain point of view. And I think that's all I'll say about that, since my opinions on the subject tend to be highly theological in nature, something that's outside the bounds of this particular discussion.
One thing to keep in mind is that saving young Ben and causing him to become the eventual leader of the Others, results in Widmore leaving the island - ***uming he actually was leader before Ben. As bad as Ben is, I think the Others, led by Widmore, is even worse.
Remember that the Oceanic 6 are in Dharma's past, but also in their own present. Which is why, according to Faraday's rules, no one in the Dharma Initiative can die, but the Oceanic 6 can. Which also means that whatever decisions they make may not affect the future any differently, but it does affect them personally.
Sayid made the choice to shoot Ben. Ben will still live and become a monster (maybe because of the shooting), but Sayid will never be able to live with himself again after shooting an innocent child. Jack has become a different man, one that he may also regret becoming. On the other end, Sawyer has "done a lot of growing up the last 3 years."
So the events we are seeing are not shaping the future of the Island and its inhabitants, but rather we are seeing the progression of character of the Oceanic 6. Maybe this will take the frustration out of the predestination and free will arguments.
Long live Hurley and Miles!
Ya know, this reminds me of a thought I had after last week's episode.
After seeing Ben carted off to the Others (and ostensibly, his destiny), I thought "What if things don't turn out how we think they do?" In order for events to have happened the way they did that makes Ben become the person we know, the Others to kill off the DI, etc etc, this is what would happen:
1) Ben gets Temple-ized, goes back to Dharmaville as a mole.
2) Ben spends 11 years there, doing intelligence gathering or whatever the Others needed, only breaking away long enough to kidnap Alex.
3) The order is given to begin the Purge, and Ben facilitates it, then becomes leader of the Others in the aftermath.
Now, what if this chain of events now differs because of the involvement of the Oceanic 6 (most specifically, Sayid)? The scenario I envisioned had Ben get his life saved by the Temple, but then he CHOOSES to believe that the Others (represented by Sayid) tried to kill him in cold blood. So instead of joining them, he rallies the Dharma Initiative against the Others, driving them into the hills out of revenge.
The results of this scenario would be:
1) The Purge never happens.
2) The Others never take over the Barracks, which is why all the signs and photographs still remain.
3) The radio tower stays in control by the Dharma Initiative, which means Rousseau never records her message. And this might explain why the numbers are still repeating in Ajira's version of the present.
Now, that's alot of WILD theorycrafting, but imagine that such a scenario could happen SIMPLY BECAUSE BEN CHANGED HIS MIND ABOUT THE OTHERS! This is where a set course of events was severely un-set by an X factor (the Lostaways) inserted into a Y scenario (the Island circa '77).
It's interesting to think about, anyway.
I wrote a paper for an ***ignment in high school that dealt with the free will topic. I'm happy to say I got an A on it. It was a good read.
Anyway, this from Tempest: "The trick is determining what we can control and what we can't. We can't control the consquences of our actions or other people, but we do have a choice about what actions we take."
Except that what if the choices about what actions we take, aren't really our choices at all? Follow me on this, it was the subject of my paper.
We believe they are our choices, and thus our free will decisions. But what if even our choices aren't really free will at all, our choices are predetermined by God, if you believe in Him, or they are predetermined by some other force, perhaps, fate?
This philosophy would dictate that we have no free will and thus everything is controled by some other entity or force.
So the trick then becomes, why have the belief in free will? Because the entity or force wants us to believe in it, or free will really does exist?
A++++++ :>)