Question about the Doctor *Spoiler up to Cabin Fever*

[Ro_Laren]

During some episode this season the Doctor from the freighter washed up to the shore dead with a slashed throat. In the episode Cabin Fever one of the mercenaries said that he received a morris code message that the Doctor washed up to the shore with his throat slit. A couple minutes later while in an argument with Lapidis, Keamy decides to slash the doctors throat and throw him off the boat to make a point.

Now tonight I was watching the ABC rerun of Cabin Fever and was reading the clues at the bottom of the screen. After Keamy killed the Doctor the message read: "It would seem the doctor's body... did not float to the island's shore... at the correct bearing." What in the world does the bearing have to do with the Doctor floating dead to the shore? Yes, I know that there is a certain bearing that you have to follow to get on or off the island. But what does that have to do with the Doctor's dead body getting there? He definitely would have been dead by the time he made it 90 miles to float to the island (even if he didn't have to follow a bearing to get there). As a matter of fact, since the body happened to get to the island that means it did follow the correct bearing to float to the island's shore.

So what did the message mean????

 

[biotech]

You have to follow the correct bearing to arrive at the island in the same time period you set off from.

 

[Alidar Jarok]

Yeah, it seems the bearing has to do with temporal distortions, not with getting off at all. The only issue is Live Together, Die Alone, where Desmond didn't get far from the island. In that case, I think it's simply that the island didn't want him to leave, so he was directed back (rather than anything to do with a compass).

 

[biotech]

Actually I think that may have been his boat.

Its possible Widmore made sure Penny would cross paths with Desmond and give him a rigged ship, set to go to the island and always come back to it.

 

[Ben Sisko3]

Yeah, it seems the bearing has to do with temporal distortions, not with getting off at all. The only issue is Live Together, Die Alone, where Desmond didn't get far from the island. In that case, I think it's simply that the island didn't want him to leave, so he was directed back (rather than anything to do with a compass).

Also in "Live Together, Die Alone", Ben gives Michael a bearing (315) that is entirely inconsistent with Daniel's bearing (305). Although, knowing Ben, he might have done that for a reason.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

"It would seem the doctor's body... did not float to the island's shore... at the correct bearing." What in the world does the bearing have to do with the Doctor floating dead to the shore?

That would synch up well with the theory that the bearings are the way you get from the Island to various realities, which are slightly out of phase time-wise with each other, and also have slight differences their details, though not so much that you'd immediately realize that you were in the "wrong" reality. The doctor's body didn't come from the reality we've been seeing, with the boat, but with a slightly different reality, where his death occurred earlier either because events happened differently, or because that reality is ahead of the boat reality we know about. (I also suspect the people from the boat are not from the same reality as the Flight 815 people).

The Island is like a sea urchin and the bearings are the spines back to various parallel realities. I know Lindhof and Cuse said they weren't doing multiple realities but they also said they weren't doing time travel, so they're liars. They probably meant they aren't doing some specific type of multiple reality/time travel and worded the interview very carefully to throw us off the scent.

I'm also wondering if the fragmented realities were created by time-travellers (the Quantum Leap type time travel we've seen Desmond do). Desmond created a new reality by time travel; maybe this behavior shatters reality, which would be a neat way of tying everything up. The Island creates the ability to time travel which in turn creates the realities. The Island gives you access to the realities because it was the source of the fragmentation to begin with.

Also in "Live Together, Die Alone", Ben gives Michael a bearing (315) that is entirely inconsistent with Daniel's bearing (305).

That was one of the first clues that there are multiple realities. 315 goes back to Flight 815's original reality. Daniel & the boaties come from a different reality that you get to via 305. Jack et al are in the wrong reality, where Christian and Charlie are still alive. And I'm still holding out for the Indonesian crash to be legitimate. The corpses of Sayid, Jack, Sun, Kate, and Aaron (still a fetus) from reality 305 are in that plane. For whatever reason, Charlie 305 never got on the plane, but apparently everyone else did.

I also think Ben is going around and murdering his dopplegangers in all other realities just because they creep him out that they exist. This doesn't synch with anything we've seen so far, I just think it would be funny.

The only issue is Live Together, Die Alone, where Desmond didn't get far from the island.

If time travel is causing the multiple realities, that means there's a finite number of them and there wouldn't be conduits to the outside world from every heading. Desmond probably just didn't stumble across any particular working conduit and was bounced back.

ARGH! I cannot WAIT for Thursday!!!!!