@blankfist I suppose one interpretation is that the authors of the Island is the people on oceanic 815, and they fill in elements they need until they could get some closure and move on.

My interpretation is that what happened on the Island during the whole show was real in the same sense as when Dumbledore talks to Harry after he's dead:

"Tell me one last thing," said Harry. "Is this real? Or has this been happening inside my head?"
"Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?"

I think everything that happened on the Island was "invented" by the "survivors", who for their own reasons could not move on, on their own. They got caught in a limbo of their own creation. The different people who actually popped up once in a while like libby, ana-lucia etc. might have been on the plane, but actually moved on already, explaining why they weren't in the church at the end.

I still have unanswered questions about Jacob, MIB and stuff like that, but many of the smaller things like the hatch, which was portrayed as a "Big Thing" might not have been all that important, it was what locke needed at the time, so it sorta popped up. (yeah, it's a bit of a cop-out solution, but it works.)

>> ^Sarzy:

What about the hatch? I don't think there was anything about the hatch that was left completely ambiguous -- that seems to be one of the few elements on the show that didn't really leave any lingering questions. Am I forgetting something?

Here's a few unanswered questions about the hatch:

Why did the Dharma initiative want to build it? Why did they think it was important, and needed to be kept secret? What was the significance of the numbers? Why did the door say Quarantine on it? What did "the Button" actually do, and why did it need to be pushed every 108 minutes? Why did hieroglyphs appear on the countdown clock when it was finally allowed to reach zero? What started happening when the clock reached zero? What happened when Desmond activated the failsafe? What was the failsafe? Why did Desmond start seeing flashes of the future from that point forward? Was he really seeing the future? Did the hatch have anything to do with the smoke monster/light plotline? Did the "others" know or care about what was going on with the hatch? Did Jacob have any sort of position or interest in what happened in the hatch?

What effect did the nuclear bomb set off at the base of the hatch before it was built have, other than sending everyone back to the "present"? Was the button version of the hatch built as a direct consequence of what our own merry band of castaways did in the 70's?

Don't get me wrong, I understand that shows will pointedly try to get you to forget stuff a few years back that doesn't fit the story they've decided to tell in the present. The hatch and the numbers were ancient history, and I can forgive them for pretending like it doesn't matter anymore.

I'm mostly annoyed that even stuff they brought up in just the last two seasons didn't get any kind of explanation or payoff, like the nuclear bomb last season, and the central conflict between Jacob and his smoky adversary this season. I expected them to at least try to build a new internally consistent mythology, and try to retcon in as much of the previous seasons as possible.

Instead we got "none of this matters" as our big explanation for what's been happening on the island. Meh.

I just have one unanswered question about all of these questions: why the FUCK does it matter?

@Sarzy. Didn't leave any lingering questions? Did we watch the same show?

The hatch, by the way, set up so many new questions. If you remember, they had to enter random numbers (which we find out was the candidate numbers on the list, sigh), then the room would freak out with hieroglyphics on everything if they didn't press the button, and the place blew up at the end of season 2. So. No explanation what hatch was really for? Why are there hieroglyphics on the wall?

Are you okay with the "numbers" that kept coming up being their candidate list numbers? These were the numbers they had to also enter into the hatch's machine. Why? Because Jacob is god or something? I don't know.

Flash sideways. Yeah, I had to google that. So, the idea is, according to Lostapedia, "the incident" where the atomic bomb blew up was the beginning of the flash sideways events, and that's quite possibly where they died. Fuck me. How can any sane person figure that out when they could've also died at the end of season 2 when the hatch blew up? See? It gets stupider the more I think about it.

There were just too many unanswered questions or plot devices set up and then glossed over without explanation.

> ^HadouKen24:
In the current (read: last fifteen years or so) state of the discussion of the philosophy of mind, the argument for or against dualism does not hinge upon whether science has yet provided a coherent account of consciousness--we all know it hasn't--but whether it can in principle provide such an account. It is not obvious that any advance in science could provide us with a satisfactory account of consciousness. It is thus not an argument from ignorance.




Argument from ignorance: claiming something is true because it has not been proven false. (or vice versa)

"We do not know" vs "we cannot know". Substance dualism is still filling in the gaps where there is no testable consensus. There is nothing inherently wrong with speculation... it's how we form theories and predictions to test. The problem is when people say "we don't know, so we're unlikely to ever know, therefore it means <insert opinion> is what is really going on".

Of course, it could take pages and pages just to define the exact definitions of the terms and phrases we are debating. I think most of the issue here is when someone mentions "dualism", "non-physical", etc, that different readers assume slightly different meanings. I may be addressing points that weren't even made due to my interpretation the the language used.

I'll try to be specific. My arguments target those who base their conclusions on a lack of evidence rather than reproducible experimental results or observations. I do not accept the argument that any part of consciousness is beyond the scope of science, because there is no evidence for it, other than the fact the we do not currently know everything about the mind. Such and argument my be stronger when cognitive research grinds to a halt despite unanswered questions, but research in that area is currently progressing faster than any other time in human history.

On the other hand, if all substance dualism states is "there are parts of human experience that science cannot currently account for" then I can't disagree. Just realize that such a statement is not evidence for anything.

In summary:

Speculation = fine.
Acceptance of speculation as reality = logical fallacy.

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:>
Sorry bub, you may believe whatever you wish to believe, but if you wish to convince others you're going to have to make your point with peer reviewed research. Those are the breaks, kid. Life is hard.


Funny that you would say that, I haven't seen your peer reviewed research. But that's right, you don't need it because you have a link to wikipedia about global warming consensus. A consensus given to us by the IPCC. You should know that the IPCC is not comprised of only scientists. There are many activists from enviromental groups such as greenpeace as well. So your statement about politics having nothing to do with climate change is truely wrong. They have everything to do with it.

Also you more than anyone should stay informed about the massive critic "aka hockey stick" that is hitting CRU right now, if you plan to keep tossing your wikipedia links. There are plenty unanswered questions.

I do not wish to convince anyone of anything, I'm just tired of the close mindedness around this subject. Unfortunately if you ever saw what happens to scientists who don't conform to your consensus you might understand why they aren't willing to risk their career because they think something sounds fishy.

I think it would be good to *discuss this since there is a couple unanswered questions, that I dont have answers to

Far too many unanswered questions. I believe they will some day be answered, but not any time soon unfortunately; Obama will here also be flaccid.

It's just a shame that Charlie Sheen is involved. I can't stand that no-talent doofus.

Good job Charlie Sheen.

It's nice to see a 9/11 questions video that cuts through all of the conspiracy bullshit and summarizes genuine unanswered questions that should have been covered in the 9/11 report.

Regardless of the conspiracy theorists there should still be an unimpeded independant investigation. I'm not sure why anybody wouldn't expect or encourage that.

The budget for the Monica Lewinski sex scandal investigation was $6.2 million and $3 million was set aside for the non independant 9/11 investigation. Crazy

I voted Matrix - as the only fucking one, you ingrates - because it was the one the appealed to my brains the most, with Star Trek as second choice.

As pure movie experience, I'm not certain. Star Wars was a great experience (Lightsabers - without those, Star Wars would never have been popular. You all know it.), but ultimately a simple story about Good vs. Evil. Same with Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter. Harry Potter has the added value that you see the kids growing up, so there's like teenage development going on as well. Star Trek is a crappy movie series, but it's still good sci-fi - though I suppose the TV series is superior to the movies.

Matrix had both the movie experience layer and the brain boogling aspect down, even if they dropped the ball in the last one. It was not nearly as big of a let down as BSG, for instance, but it still had way too many unanswered questions - wtf was the gold code Neo saw? In the I think it was the most interesting and interpretable story and therefor it got my vote.

So if my Parole Officer calls, is it ok if I let the ansering machine pick it up? Or is that bad etiquette? What about my Ex-Wife? Do I have to sound interested when I talk to her?

Finally, what if I go to the wrong house? Do I owe the homeowner 5 dollars? This video really left a lot of unanswered questions.

This isn't garbage at all.

Our country was attacked on 9/11, and Al Qaeda had nothing to do with it.

OK, who did it? Is there evidence to back up that assertion? Really? Does that evidence actually come together to form a logical story that isn't self-contradictory and doesn't rely on motivations that would require hundreds of crazy, inconsistent people involved and a massive conspiracy of silence? All I ever see are lists of "unanswered questions" - exactly the kind of runny crap that moon-landing hoaxers bring up.

The other tactic used heavily here is changing the subject. It doesn't matter how many of the old questions were answered in the report - they were never the real questions. Now the real question is why don't they talk more about their shadow-based dating. THAT'S SO VERY UNSCIENTIFIC. THESE SO-CALLED ENGINEERS NEED TO RESIGN! RESIGN THEMSELVES TO A LIFE OF PRISON FOREVER THAT IS!

Look, when your anti-American nutball conspiracy is so - I'm just going to say it - stupid that Noam Chomsky won't even placate its believers, won't even hedge his bets on whether it has merit, then you know you're out to lunch.

And don't bother replying (to me anyway). I have all your comments on ignore, and will forever. You may think this makes me a coward. Feel free to post about that to people who don't have you on ignore. However, I can say with confidence that you will never have anything interesting to say, ever, in your miserable, stupid life - so I don't think I'll miss anything.

Sorry for the wall of text, but it's split up - just three individual rebuttals(mostly). Three posts in one maybe? 1 is about potential life, 2 is our screwed up scale and the attacks made utilising the opponent's uncertainty and 3 is the broken terminology being used to implicitly argue.

If just one person is better off for reading just one of these points I'll be happy

Ok, some argument flaws to point out which I see have seen largely unaddressed so far:

1. Argument for potential life (I think thepinky used this one, as well as others). Left alone in its unique environment x will become y; z will not. This is pure inaction bias. The absence of taking action is an action itself. When making a choice, either doing something or not bestows the exact same responsibility given a neutral context. In real social situations, there are other actors which may have brought about a situation, etc, so it's a bit more complex there.

Basically, leaving a fertilised egg in place and removing it are both positive actions. You cannot say that there is potential life because of "what would have happened". This is also countered by pretty much any cell in the body being able to become an individual human being. From skin cells you scratch off to millions of sperm to eggs, they are all potential human beings. This is usually "countered" by saying it is innate potential, not just potential. That is the no true scottsman fallacy. It also stems from inaction bias.

What are the consequences? Whatever scale you use to rate or determine if something counts as a person you must apply it objectively to both the fertilised egg and everything else. Just prepare for cognitive dissonance, however, since when rating a fertilised egg's level of consciousness or personhood generally a sperm of unfertilised egg is pretty much rates exactly the same.

2. Which leads us to point two. The scale we try to make to classify varying levels of devlopment is completely messed up. This would be a scientific problem if only science were actually in the position to answer our questions to a degree of confidence. Nobody knows what constitutes consciousness or the nature of it. At the moment our most informed observations say that brains are conscious. We don't know how, why, if consciousness is anything but an illusion, if it is specific to brains (or things like brains), if it is physical, the nature of existence and so on!

The passive argument "Look at all these unasnwered questions in your reasoning! If you're more wrong, we're more right." is silly. It just makes that argument more "wrong"; your own retains however much wrongness it had!

Also, the absence of unanswered questions does not make a good argument. Wanna see me answer all questions in existence? God did it. There! No, you build a model and apply it to reality. The better it fits, the better the model. I heard things brought up like why do dogs and pigs not have more rights than human fetuses then? Good question. Our scale is messed up, but we at a species are trying. We can hope to eventually have these things sorted, if at all physically possible for us.

3. Being hung up on the term "human life" or similar. Arguing in a biological sense about whether a fertilised egg (or sperm, or egg) is "human" or not, is classed as part of the human species or other definition.

The problem is people stop at that definition. For example, "From a fertilised egg to birth to death it is always a human being, for such and such sound reasoning, therefor they have the interests of a person." In the case of being a human as in part of this species, you have to remember species is a distinction for purely usefulness purposes in biology. It is arbitrary and meant as a tool - it has no bearing to the actual debate at hand.

My point being, many of the terms used around here have no basis in the context of the argument. One person is talking about a human life in the strict biological sense as basis for personhood and the other is using a description more along the lines of sentient, conscious, able to feel, etc. Be careful around the terms human, life, etc.

That's it for what I can remember for now

So, despite everything we don't know, the best we can go on at the moment says a fertilised egg is nothing special, that a fly's brain is over 100,000 neurons, so what of that 50-cell blostocyst mentioned so much? The best we can determine is it's a gradual scale from no consciousness to more. Drawing lines is horribly messy but observation of reality at least says if it has no neurons it is no more different than any other clump of matter or cells or anything. So far. What happens if we try to draw the line closer, when we try and determine at which point it becomes "conscious enough"? Fierce debate. That is good, but right now debating whether a fertilised egg is anything special is drawing attention away from the important area.

BillO - How does the fact that you see no prior great Presidents mean Obama isn't going to be one himself? Logic fail, buddy.

Schmawy - The more important unanswered question is: What were you wearing in the dream? Details, kitty, DETAILS!

Nordlich - How the HELL can you NOT like Bailey's?

Okay, I feel better now.

*promote, because this is a thousand times more informative than any other show or documentary about the events and unanswered questions surrounding 9-11. It must be sifted!