The numbers in Ajira 316
Just a thought : why does everybody say that the numbers playing on the radio before Ajira crashes is proof of an alternate time line ? Don’t get me wrong, I believe in ATL, but not for this reason.
What I mean is that we have no idea what happened on the Island between 2004 and 2007. We can reasonably think that no Losties are presents, meaning the Island is completely in the hand of the Others, or the Natives (Juliet is flashing through time, so maybe the Others that are not Natives also do. Maybe even Ben would have if he still was on the Island).
So they easily might have reset the message so that the numbers are broadcasted again, to lure some more people to the Island (it worked for Rousseau’s team, and the signal was heard by Sam Toomey and Leonard Simms which started a chain of event that lead Hurley to the Island as well), or for any other reasons that we cannot imagine yet.
Occam’s razor : if there is a message broadcasted with the numbers that was not there before, then someone probably put it there (somewhat more simple that the creation of an alternate time line…)
i agree, and it’s one of my problems with people using that as evidence of an alt timeline… i think it’s much more likely that one of the others walked up there and pushed “play”…
The others don’t want people on the island, so why are they broadcasting to lure people? And we’ve been given no evidence that the numbers were played by the others originally, so your occam’s razor thought is based on assumption not any actual evidence
True it is based entirely on assumption, then again, the numbers were playing in the nineties when rousseau’s team crashed, and that was after teh purge, so if the others didn’t want the numbers playing and drawing people to the island, they would have just turned them off.
and even if it is based on assumption, so is the alt timeline explanation of the numbers being heard… the truth is that none of us know anything about why the numbers may be playing, so it’s all just speculation…
Rousseau arrived on the island in 1988, so the purge hadn’t happened. I’m not saying it hasn’t happened this way, but when people pull occam’ a razor as a trump card, for me it needs to be based on solid evidence from the show, otherwise it’s just a thought. My theories are just my thoughts on what’s happening and I haven’t claimed them to be any more but when I propose something I make sure I can back it up with something from the show as a justification. If the others put the numbers there, there would be some evidence, if anything Dharma are the ones who have repeatedly used the numbers so far. Free ideas are great, I just question them for some evidence, that’s all.
if the purge hadn’t happened by the time that rousseau put her own message in the radio tower, then why wouldn’t the DI have noticed, or stopped her?
Based on current information the purge seems to have happened in 1992. Alex is 16 in 2004 which means she was born in 1988. I don’t know who put the numbers out there, I don’t necessarily think it was DI but it doesn’t strike me as something the others would do either.
New thought, the numbers hadn’t been playing for 16 years, if the others wanted them broadcasting why didn’t they switch the tapes at any time in the last 16 years? Suddenly in 2004 they realise and go ‘gosh we should get those freaky numbers up and playing again to lure some unexpecting scientists.’ Doesn’t make sense to me.
The clincher for me is that from a screenwriting 101 perspective, you don’t go to the trouble of showing information like that to the audience unless it means something. They had to make a conscious choice to show something contradictory to what they had already set up.
hhmmm you’re both right, it doesn’t really make sense, then again I can’t think of a logical reason why either the DI or the others would want the numbers to be playing, probably because I don’t know the significance of the numbers yet…
However, to base such a large theory as the alt timeline theory on this bit of evidence seems a bit shaky, admittedly there is other evidence, but not much more…
I think that since none of us know the significance of the numbers, it’s difficult to use them in any theory, because you don’t know why they would be playing and you don’t know who wants them to play in the first place…
the numbers and their broadcast is a huge mystery, the timing of them playing and not is pretty straightforward and the fact that they are again playing in 2007 indicated that something has changed. I don’t think anyone has based their whole theory I an alt timeline on that alone, there is a huge amount of evidence in the show leading us to that conclusion, it can explain so much, the numbers are just one small piece of the puzzle. But again, the anti alt people haven’t demonstrated any evidence that proves otherwise. Coming into the final season, everything that will happen has been foreshadowed in some way already, so if there was evidence to dispute the ton of stuff leading towards change give it to me. Like I’ve said I was once anti alt, the evidence just isn’t there, if you’ve got it I’m really interested.
In “This Place is Death” 1988, Danielle’s team has a radio and if you listen closely you can hear that it’s Hurley’s voice repeating the numbers. But, when Ajira comes to the island in 2007 you can clearly hear that it’s Chang’s voice repeating the numbers…
With that being said, I don’t think it’s as simple as someone coming along and pushing play… Somewhere along the line the numbers had to be re-recorded.
So, why were the numbers originally recorded? I think it was Hurley who once recorded the numbers himself, so that the numbers would lead him to the island… Kind of ironic don’t you think?
So, then why were they in Chang’s voice when Ajira was landing in 2007? Guess that remains to be seen.
For me it’s an accumulative thing. With my “Alt Timeline Started with Ajira” theory, I hypothesized based on all that we were shown, and looked for a way to join the dots in a way that stood up to attack. I was looking for evidence that it WASN’T the case, INCLUDING Occam’s Razor-style thinking. If I recall, the numbers on Ajira and the changes in Dharmaville were things people noted (Tas?) immediately after I uploaded my theory, and they actually added to the evidence for that sort of idea. So it’s not just based on one or even 2 things, but a whole bunch of them that include multiple things to do with Locke and Desmond, and so on, and the fact that no-one had been able to contradict this theory’s viewpoint…yet. 😉
Elsewhere, Agreed. It’s funny – I listened to the Ajira numbers broadcast a few times trying to figure out whose voice it was. To my ear it was up in the air – it could be either Chang or Hurley.
Ok Yojimb, I just went and re-read your theory and all of the comments that go with it (there were quite a few). So I feel that I completely understand where you are coming from as far as your viewpoint is concerned…
I still disagree with the alt-timeline theory, but I’ve been over it a million times with you and other people…
So now that I understand your viewpoint a bit more, I would really like to know your take on my most recent theory. I know it’s long and involved, but if it makes the task any less daunting time-wise, you can skim through part one.
As far as contradicting the alt-timeline theory, you’re right, I can’t. But I think that my theory explains a lot of the same phenomena as yours, and I think you will have a hard time contradicting it as well. Which puts us at a stand still until Feb 2. Still, I’d like to know what you think of my theory.
According to Lostpedia when Hurley confronts Rousseau about the numbers when her team arrives on ‘the island’ in 1988, she states the following:
Rousseau says that the Numbers were what brought her to the Island, like they brought Hurley.
The numbers were being broadcast before 1988 and it is unknown as to whose voice it was on the recording.
The following is the time-line of the Ajira Crash, also from Lostpedia:
In January of 2008, Ajira Airways Flight 316 departed from LAX in Los Angeles, California bound for Guam, a U. S. territory in the western Pacific. Ten hours into the flight, the airplane began to experience heavy turbulence and a flash of bright light engulfed the plane sending them back in time, some to 2007, some to 1977. The pilot Lapidus then guided the plane to an emergency crash landing onto Hydra Island runway in the Pacific Ocean.
Considering the above information, it makes good logic that the broadcast of the numbers being heard, were what would have been originally playing in 1977, prior to Rousseau recording her distress message.
So, what is this indicative of? Not really sure, but chances are, it was being picked up from the time period Ajira was flying through. Nonetheless, it makes for good debate. 😉
I thought of that, but when you rewatch the Ajira crash, the 1977 flash happensthen they are in daylight over Hyrda Island that when we here the numbers they see the runway and land. It’s definately in the 2007 time, nothing flashes or changes between the numbers and the landing.
Are the numbers that we hear when Flight 316 lands the actual numbers?
I thought they were just numbers of the lang. and long. of where they were? I watched that scene a couple of times when it first aired and it didn’t sound like the “numbers”. I haven’t seen it for a while though so I might be wrong. But arce you absolutely sure?
Even if they are playing, 3 years have passed since the O6 left, so someone could’ve gone back to the tower and changed the transmission back to the numbers.
I know that when Rousseau and her team land on the island they can hear the numbers, and it sounds much like Hurley, but the numbers you hear when 316 lands seem different.
Correct me if I’m wrong. Is there a transcript?
Ok my bad. I just found a clip on youtube and it does sound like the numbers.
I still think that someone could’ve just started playing it again within the 3 years that have passed since the O6 left.
So I agree with you berbert, that this doesn’t prove there’s an ALT timeline.
I’ve been out of the theorizing loop for while- where is the evidence that the Ajira flight did in fact go back in time from 1/08 to sometime in 2007? I don’t remember that being dicussed at any point in the season. If the plane had to course correct into a period days, weeks or months in the past then that is probably the MOST convincing evidence of an alternate timeline, way more so then the presence of the numbers and who may have re-recorded them or turned them on.
Trinity – That’s right, it doesn’t PROVE it; but why would they add in something that conflicts with continuity for no reason? Sure there are any number of reasons, but it points TO it more than it does AWAY from it. 🙂
Perhaps it was Jacob’s (or Jacob’s nemisis) will – the order was past onto Ben.
I don’t think the show ever says the date as being in 2008. But I might be wrong. The show does however say that Sawyer, etc. are in 1977, then flashes with the words thirty years later.
I don’t think it’s safe to assume that the Others don’t want people on the island. If they are in fact working for Jacob (and not mistaking Nemesis for Jacob), Jacob actually wants people there for his game.