Rewatching LOST: That's Not My Name

NATURE V. NURTURE


Sneaky, sneaky Darlton! Did you notice the comment they made about the "Nature v. Nurture" theme in LOST? It's right in the middle of their commentary on "Across the Sea" [AGAIN with the wonderful clues! Read the FULL TRANSCRIPT HERE].

Carlton Cuse: We sort of saw this [episode] as its own little morality play. And understanding the personal relationships between Jacob, the Man in Black, and their mother or their surrogate mother in this case, was really the thing that interested us as storytellers. And again, like everyone else on Lost, they're not black and white depictions. I think that there might have been sort of a notion that the Man in Black was all evil and that Jacob was all good. But this episode kind of is our attempt to say, "No, it's actually much more complicated than that." And particularly, we wanted this episode to challenge your assumptions about the Man in Black.

Damon Lindelof: Yeah, and kind of what's cool and is articulated in the scene we're about to see is there's this idea of nature versus nurture. And Mother already recognizes that the Man in Black is capable of doing something that Jacob isn't. Which is lying. And this is his nature. She's gonna nurture them. She's gonna shape these boys. But these boys are very different. And she's identifying the Boy in Black as special, a word that we have heard used to describe other individuals on Lost. Obviously, the Boy in Black shares certain attributes with these characters. We'll see that he demonstrates he can see dead people. Where Jacob cannot. But he's got this wanderlust. His need to leave the island and find out what's across the sea is essentially a very accessible desire, and it ends up being his undoing.

For those of you unaware, the Nature v. Nurture debate struggles to define RESPONSIBILITY.

That right -- I didn't say "humanity" or "identity" because guess what? Who You are is defined by your MEMORY [of experience and knowledge]. Your memory forms the BASIS of your perspective. What it means to be "human" is defined by PERSPECTIVE. Tricky. Guess what else? Perspective and memory can be manipulated -- EASILY and without your knowledge or consent. We've seen it over and over again in science fiction and over and over again on LOST.

The Nature v. Nurture question wants to know: how much of your behavior is YOUR fault, and how much of your behavior is NOT your fault.

Most of our LOST characters have one or both names of prominent [Western] philosophers [From LOSTpedia philosophers entry]: Richard Alpert, John Austen, Mikail Bukunin, Jeremy Bentham, Edmund Burke, Joseph Campbell, Thomas Carlyle, Anthony Ashley-Cooper, Hugo De Groot, David Hume, John Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Clive Staples Lewis [just to name a few].

[Wait, Hugo De Groot? Really? Oh, we're totally coming back to that one!]

A deeper analysis into each of these philosophers would lead us into the fray of human existence: How much power do we have to shape the world around us? Are we merely ignorant pawns in a huge plan? How do we as humans balance the needs of the many against the needs of the few? Is there such thing as a "greater good?" Who should wield power in a society and why? How much does the "letter" of the law weigh against the "spirit" of the law? What "archetypes" are universal across cultures? How does a spectrum of cultures originate the same types of mythology/mythological figures?

All very cool stuff. However, we, lovely LOST readers, are sticking to the BIG PICTURE. For us, these philosophers fall primarily into one of two camps.

Camp Blame Individuals -- We are solely responsible for our behavior. We make choices, and those choices, good or bad, have consequences. The responsibility for our behaviors ultimately lies within us.

Camp Blame Society -- We were FINE until social conventions, laws, governments, religions and economics screwed us up. The responsibility for our behaviors lies OUTSIDE of ourselves -- in society.

Thanks to scientific advances [across many fields] during the late 20th Century, we have a third camp: Blame Your Problem and/or Your Biology.


That third camp is not a frivolous one. If you catch your husband/wife in bed with someone else, lose your mind and bash their heads in, BY LAW you are allowed to blame Your Problem: temporary insanity. Same thing if you are under-aged, mentally incapacitated or below a certain IQ threshold -- BY LAW you are given some leeway in how responsible you are for your actions because of Your Biology.

Interesting to note: Your Biology can trump Your Problem depending on the circumstances of your behavior. If you kill someone because you are spun on crank, you can blame Your Problem [drug addiction], but you aren't gettin' much sympathy from the judge. If you kill someone defending your own life or the life of another, that's totally different. You can blame Your Biology [that fight or flight instinct --->Primal FEAR!!], but legally speaking, you have the right to BE ALIVE and STAY ALIVE. Defending yourself is a "natural right."

In each case the crime is the same: you have killed someone else. However, which one do you think will land you in jail? [Don't answer that! It's an election year!]

It gets even more complicated when Your Problem's/Biology's impact on you is measured on a subjective sliding scale: If you steal to feed your family, your crime is judged in a different light than if you steal to buy yourself a nice set of steak knives. Question is: who gets to sit in judgment over you and why?

The Nature v. Nurture theme has always seemed a bit redundant to me -- we've got all the Free will v. Destiny/Choice v. Fate/Science v. Faith to deal with [NOTICE I did NOT say Good v. Evil]. After Darlton's comment above tho, I started thinking about how often they've mentioned "Daddy Issues," and how often we've seen characters abandoned, mistreated, used, sacrificed, left behind and ignored by their parents or parental figures [Or TAKEN by OTHERS].

Time to take a closer look.

THE NAME GAME

Watch how the NAMES of our losties play out the Nature v. Nurture theme. If you think about it, your LAST name, your FAMILY name [typically speaking] is the "Nature" side of your name. You inherit your last name from one or both parents, adoptive or biological. You inherit your GENES from your PROgenetors: your biological parents. Your DNA, your BIOLOGY or BIOCHEMISTRY is the primary fall guy when it comes to explaining your behavior in "instinctive" terms.

Your FIRST name, however, is NOT inherited. It's chosen and has no genetic influence or predetermination attached to it.


Your first name identifies you, but it's your LAST name that puts you in CONTEXT.

It's no wonder then that we learn most of our losties' first names WELL before we learn their last names. After the pilot, we only know the first names of Jack, Kate, Charlie, Sayid, Hurley, Boone, Shannon, Walt, Vincent and Sawyer.

For example:

• We don't know Mr. Locke's first name is John until "Walkabout" [Kate says it with their boar hunt goes bad].
• We don't know Christian's first name until "All The Best Cowboys Have Daddy Issues." [But we know he's Dr. Shephard and "my father."]
• We don't know Sawyer's first OR last name for a while.
  

In the flash sideways world ["Happily Ever After"] many familiar characters have the same FIRST names but different LAST names.

• Daniel Faraday becomes Daniel Widmore.
• Eloise Hawking becomes Eloise Widmore.
• Penny Widmore becomes Penny Milton.
• Sun-Hwa Kwon becomes Sun Paik.

Important to notice that a few characters hide both their first and/or last names on the island or change their names -- most often in the flashes.

• Hurley is Hugo Reyes.
• Sawyer is James Ford.
• Ethan's last name is "Goodspeed," but he tells Hurley it's "Rom." ["Solitary"]
• Kate uses a bunch of names while she's on the run.
• Anthony Cooper admits he uses lots of names in his cons. ["The Brig"]
• Miles' Dad. Pierre Chang uses a different name in nearly every Dharma Initiative Orientation video.
• Sawyer/James Ford changes his name to the "fake" name of the con man who got his parents killed. He also has a "con" name: Jim LeFleur.

Losties' last names are SHOWN to us in the flashes and put our losties' identities -- their "baggage" -- into context. Their baggage, go figure, comes directly from the ties to their OTHER name and the "previous life" attached to it.

• For Juliet, Burke is her ex-husband's last name [her maiden name is Carlson. It's also the name she uses in the flash sideways]. His possessiveness informs who she is on the island. ["The Other Woman"]
• Jack shares his last name with his father. Being under his father's shadow informs his decisions on the island.
• Locke has his mother's name -- the mother that abandoned him and helped con him out of his kidney. ["Deus Ex Machina"]
• Claire has her mother's name -- when she finally does meet Christian, she specifically tells him, "I don't want to know your name." ["Par Avion"]
• Walt's last name is Lloyd, his mother's name -- his mother who separated Walt from his father, Michael Dawson, at a very young age. ["Special"]
• Kate's last name, Austen, belonged to her "father," Sam. However, her biological Dad's last name is Jenssen [Wayne]. ["What Kate Did"]
• Aaron's last name changes depending on who's got custody of him: Kate, Claire or Claire's mom.
• Miles gives his name as "Straum," but his mother and father both share the name "Chang."

Think of how many FIRST names are repeated [Go to Lostpedia for more Character NAMES]: Charles/Charlie/Chuck/Charlotte, Daniel/Danielle/Danny, Tom/Thomas/Tommy, David/Dave, etc.

Think of how the names relate to each other: JACK is a nickname for JOHN AND JACOB. JAMES is a VERSION of Jacob (they share the same cognate, or originating word). Jim is, of course, a nickname for James.

[Shoot. That can't be a coincidence.]

GRAFFITI CAVE

Weirdest of all is how our losties' LAST names are used to "pick" them as "candidates." Illana calls them all by their last names, and their last names are NUMBERED. ["The Substitute"]

[This candidate business, btw -- total bunk. Hurley was ALWAYS the ONLY one intended to take over the island from Jacob. That's why the candidates' names correspond to HURLEY'S NUMBERS.]

There's even some confusion with the last names. In a deleted scene from Season 6, Illana specifically names Sun as "the candidate." However, we know that Sun's father's name is Paik, so how does that work? Plus, didn't Jacob tell Kate her name was crossed off the wall because she "became a mother?" ["What They Died For"]. Sun had a BABY, right? So why wasn't her name crossed off? I mean, technically speaking, Kate didn't even give BIRTH. How did she earn the exemption?

[BUNK, I tell you. BUNK! This candidate business falls along the lines of Ben's pleas to convince Locke not to blow up the submarine. He tells Locke that "my people need the illusion that they can leave." This "volunteer to take over" stuff is all a DISPLAY of free will. Jack already knew it had to be HIM first, and then he (and we) already knew that Hurley was next in line for the handover. See Rewatching LOST: Hurley for more info.]

Most important question to me is: how does this Nature v. Nurture play out? If your NATURE is derived from your PARENTS, and these boys are raised by another, then perhaps NATURE is the issue here.

DEAD CENTER


If Mother is trying to "shape these boys" despite their "nature," then we need to know why. After all, according to Darlton, Mother originally wanted MIB to take over as "protector" of Scooby-Doo Cave but settled for Jacob when time ran out [. Is there something about MIB's Nature that would make him "better" at becoming "protector" of "the island?" [See Rewatching LOST: Myths and Mommy Issues.]

Damon says Mother already recognizes that KIB [Kid in Black] is capable of something Jacob can't do: tell a LIE. He also points out how Mother tags KIB as "Special" and how KIB can see the dead.

Well, if KIB can see the dead (and Jacob can't), that makes him like Hurley, correct? As far as we know, Hurley is the ONLY lostie that can see/talk to the dead on the island.

However, seeing and chatting with the dead is tricky business. BEN as a kid, saw HIS Mother after she was dead, a fact Richard is TOTALLY impressed with when he intersects with Ben in the jungle in "The Man Behind The Curtain." And Locke had a little chat with a tree-chopping Horace ["Cabin Fever"], who openly admits he's been dead for 12 years [Horace, btw, was witness to Ben's birth/his mother's death and arranged for Ben to come to the island].

• Horace: Hello there.
• Locke: Who are you?
• Horace: I'm Horace. Whew!
• Locke: And what are you doing out here?
• Horace: Oh, building a place — a little getaway for me and the missus ["This is a place you made together"]. No, I mean, sometimes you need a break from the D.I., ya know? The DHARMA Initiative? I'm not making any sense, am I?
• Locke: No.
• Horace: That's probably because I've been dead for 12 years.

Blood runs from Horace's nose. He pushes a tree down.

• Horace: Hello there. You gotta find me, John. You gotta find me. And when you do, you'll find him.
• Locke: Who?
• Horace: Jacob. (chuckles) He's been waiting for you a real long time, man.

From Damon and Carlton's Official LOST Podcast [March 21, 2008] we learn:

• It's the Monster when we see: The Medusa Spider (that paralyzed Nikki) ["Expose"] and Yemi ["The Cost Of Living"].
• It's an APPARITION when we see: Ben's mother, Emily ["The Man Behind The Curtain"].
• It's an apparition AND a figment of imagination when we see: Dave ["Dave"].

AND

• It's a Monster-Related Apparition when we see: Weirdo appearances by Walt.

And Walt the actual person is, of course, one of those "Special" losties. Just like John, whose mother, Emily Locke, tells him he's "special" in the same breath she tells him he doesn't have a father because he was "immaculately conceived" ["Deus Ex Machina"].

Hm. That's a weird thing to say. Immaculate Conception doesn't translate to "virgin birth." Immaculate Conception is part of Catholic dogma surrounding the HUMAN NATURE of Mary, the mother of Jesus Christ.

THERE'S SOMETHING ABOUT MARY


In Christianity, when God decided it was time to send his Son to Earth, he chose Mary to be the mom. He sent an angel down to give her the news in person: The Holy Spirit would be paying her a visit, and she'd magically become pregnant with God's Son. Mary was understandably freaked out. She was a virgin and under contract to marry Joseph. How's that gonna work? More importantly, how's that gonna work without getting her KILLED? [Technically, Joseph could use her pregnancy as evidence of adultery, which was a sin AND a CRIME.]

Mary broke the news to Joseph. Lucky for her, Joseph wasn't a jerk. When he learned of her pregnancy, he figured he'd break the marriage contract on the down-low and keep everything out of the press. God touched base with Joseph in a dream, assured him Mary was 1) not lying and 2) pregnant with the Messiah and told him to take her as his wife and name the baby Jesus [Matthew 1:18-21 NIV].

Mary and Joseph did not advertise the circumstances of Jesus' conception and birth after he was born. In fact, they had to take off for Egypt in the middle of the night to hide the baby from King Herod. The "We Three Kings" guys tipped Herod off to Jesus' birth on their way to deliver the gold, frankincense and myrrh. They told him the prophesy had been fulfilled. The King of Israel had been born. Herod acted thrilled about the news then ordered a clean sweep of all male babies two and under in a paranoid attempt to eliminate him.

Joseph and Mary stayed in Egypt until that Herod psycho DIED.

Prophecies of a future messiah/king/leader of Israel [the Jews] are all over the first half of the Christian Bible (Old Testament). As the second half of the Christian Bible (the New Testament) tells the story of Christ's birth, life, death, resurrection, ascension and legacy, it checks off many of those prophesies along the way. The miraculous circumstances of Jesus' conception and birth were foretold hundreds of years prior by the prophet Isaiah: “The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel” (which means 'God with us')" [Isaiah 7:14 NIV].

The prophesy system is designed to help future peeps recognize the messiah/king/leader of Israel when he finally gets here. It's also designed to help peeps weed out the crazies claiming to be the messiah. Like this:

• Guy: Hi! I'm the Messiah! Sorry it took me so long to get here.
• Peeps: Hold up! Were you born in the City of David [aka Bethlehem]?
• Guy: Uh -- no.
• Peeps: (grabbing Guy) Then you can't be the Messiah.
• Guy: Wait!
• Peeps: Off to the nuthouse with you!

Here's the thing that always got me in trouble in Sunday School [you didn't have a doubt, did you?]: The Son of God/Virgin Birth didn't bother me [probably because I really liked Christmas]. However, the prophecy stuff bothered me -- a lot.

Typical Sunday Morning in Amy's Childhood:

• Sunday School [SS] Teacher: The genealogy of Christ was part of the prophesy of his arrival as Messiah. So you see here in the very first chapter of Matthew, Jesus was a direct descendant of Abraham and King David.
• ME: No he's not.
• SS Teacher: Yes he is. Look, it says right there in your Bible that this is Jesus' lineage. Now --
• ME: My Bible also says that Joseph's not his real dad. Jesus' human half comes from Mary.
• SS Teacher: Back in Bible times, as his adoptive father, Joseph's lineage counted as Jesus' lineage.
• ME: Not if He tells everyone He's the Son of God! You can't have it both ways. Although -- maybe He was just trying to cover his bases.
• SS Teacher: Jesus Christ does not need to cover his bases!!

[Class titters.]

• SS Teacher: Just ---- Here. Have another doughnut.

[FYI: Joseph's dad was named JACOB [Matthew 1:16 NIV]. That means Jacob was Jesus' Grandad!]

For the record, I'm not the only one who had trouble with this. The Catholic church struggled to nail down the "official" complete story of Jesus' conception and birth for hundreds of years. Their problem was what to do with Mary. If she was plain old human, then she had Original Sin like all humans do. We're born with it. If Jesus was truly a human -- one of us -- as well as the Son of God, then technically speaking, he should have Original Sin, too. However, Christians firmly believe that Christ was sinless throughout his life. It's part and parcel to his sacrifice -- he was a true innocent when he was crucified.

Catholic leaders came up with a solution in 1854: Immaculate Conception.** Mary was officially Special. Since God specifically chose her, she was designated as the mother of Jesus from her own conception. It was her DESTINY. The theory is that Mary was born without Original Sin. It was removed from her by God when she was conceived. That way, she didn't have any to pass on to her child. She was "the NEW EVE who was to be the mother of the NEW ADAM" [online Catholic Encyclopedia Official Immaculate Conception doctrine HERE.]. [See Team LOST #1 Sneakiest Trick Ever: Making History for more on Adam and Eve.]

[Adam and Eve as Son and Mother? THAT'S interesting.]

Note that Immaculate Conception refers to MARY'S conception -- NOT Jesus' conception. Jesus' conception falls under the dogma of Incarnation. [Can you think of anyone referred to as INCARNATE on LOST?]. When Emily tells John he was "immaculately conceived," it's almost as weird as learning "our very own Adam and Eve" are Mother and Brother/MIB.

Believe it or not, I'm prone to think Emily tells John he is immaculately conceived so we'll think she's crazy and later figure she was conning him from the beginning. I'm also prone to think Team LOST might be using the term erroneously because they assumed what it meant. [Try not to pass out! I know how unnatural it sounds for me to blow off a potential clue!]

HOWEVER, Emily also calls John "Special," the same term Mother uses on KIB. Knowing what we know now for rewatch, how MIB will work his plan to take the form of John Locke, the correlation between these two conversations shouldn't be ignored. However, the biggest Elephant in the room remains: DADDY. Locke is asking about his father. MIB and Jacob couldn't care less. MIB is obsessed with where he "comes from," but dad never comes up. Mother specifically tells KIB: "You came from me, and I came from my mother." -- NO DADDY.

Why not? Especially if Nature v. Nurture is a theme we should be keeping in mind. 23 of your 46 chromosomes come from your FATHER and 23 come from Mom. Dad is HALF of who you are, biologically speaking. That's why Anthony Cooper is after John in the first place: He's the most likely match for a kidney transplant. Cooper takes a part of John for himself -- to prolong his own life -- and gives NOTHING in return.

Let's just run with the metaphor, shall we?

If John is "immaculately conceived," it could mean that he has a mother and a father, but, at "conception," some essential part of him was taken away. At Mary's conception, her Original Sin was removed to prepare her to conceive and give birth to an Incarnation of God: His Son. WHAT IF John's "conception" works the same way?

Horace tells John that Jacob has been waiting for him for a "long time." The others are in awe of John because of his "connection" to the island. John IS Special -- he's The One they've been waiting for in order for THE PLAN to GO FORWARD. Jacob wants to fix his "mistake." MIB wants to become an INCARNATION of John Locke so he can LEAVE.

Think about it. Locke is the only lostie that can "feel" the hatch. He's the only one looking for a PURPOSE on the island. He's the only lostie besides Hurley that's been INVITED by whoever's using the cabin. In particular, Locke's consciousness, his awareness, is instrumental to JACK'S story.

In a way, Jack is an INCARNATION of Christian Shephard. He takes his father's place as Dr. Shephard in "All The Best Cowboys Have Daddy Issues." We see Christian send Vincent to "Wake up my son" ["Missing Pieces: So It Begins"], and we see Jack's mom beg him to "bring your father home" ["White Rabbit"]. [Uh-oh! Flashback to "The Substitute!" ] We see "23 Shephard" scribbled on the wall in Graffiti Cave. Sawyer asks: "That'd be Jack Shephard?" Mock Locke answers: "There's more than one."

"My father" is wearing Jack's shoes to his own funeral -- but is NEVER in the COFFIN. And the last time we see the coffin on the ISLAND is when Jack and Hurley stop by the caves on Jack's journey to Jacob's lighthouse ["Lighthouse"]. Jack confronts the empty coffin while Hurley LOOKS OVER "ADAM and EVE." They are interred together -- in a GRAVE without a COFFIN -- as we'll see Jacob place them in "Across the Sea."

The last time we see the coffin on the show is in "The End." Jack triggers memories of the island when he touches the coffin -- the EMPTY coffin. He and CHRISTIAN reconcile the final event. Jack is the LAST person Christian touches before he opens the doors and leaves the church.

[We always seem to circle back around to Christian, don't we? He's like the Kevin Bacon of LOST!]

One last VERY weird thing:

Christian (aka "my father"), according to the same podcast quoted above, does not have his picture on the "deceased" door with all the other characters who have died, but instead on the "door that says 'undead'." According to Damon, there's only three characters on that door: One of them is Christian Shephard. One of them is Yemi. And one of them is -- Kate's horse/Just picture of a horse. "So Kate's horse is. . .Undead."

IF Nature v. Nurture is an issue in the story of Mother, Brother/MIB and Jacob, then DADDY MATTERS. In this case, Daddy is MISSING.

Next time we'll try to figure out WHERE Daddy is!

Happy Rewatching!




NOTES:

*Did you know Jesus is the Greek form of Joshua? It means "the Lord Saves." Christ is Greek for "anointed one."

**Remember: Original Sin = Awareness of Nudity. [See Team LOST #1 Sneakiest Trick Ever: Making History]

According to Genesis, Adam and Eve didn't have sex until AFTER they were tossed out of the Garden of Eden. You know what that means -- Lack of Original Sin = Virginity. Lucky enough, Mary was deemed a Perpetual Virgin from the 3rd century. [Bummer for Joseph!]

For the record, Immaculate Conception is not universally recognized in Christianity. I was raised Southern Baptist (in the actual South), and although sex before marriage is evil, bad, dirty and sinful, sex within marriage is 100% okay. Although the Christian Bible says Joseph and Mary skipped the Big Wedding Night until after she gave birth [Matthew 2:22 NIV], Southern Baptists believe that after that, Mary and Joseph were a normal husband and wife and had more kids (they are referenced later).

From LOSTpedia:


Other philosophers of note:

Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) Blaise Pascal is a French mathematician, physicist and religious philosopher. "Pascal Flats" is referenced in Lost. comparisons of Pascal to Locke: Pascal is originally a mathematician and scientist. He has a paralytic spell and many physical ailments. Pascal is left by a beloved sister and has abandonment issues. He came close to marriage, late into his bachelorhood, but it didn't take. Then Pascal has a near death experience and is converted to Jansenism/a non-mainstream sect of Christianity.

Pascal writes these letters (Provincial Letters), which are humorous and satirical, under a fake name, and he even went against the Pope. (comparison to Jacob..Pascal mentioned "god loves Jacob" in his vision, a phrase he carries with him).

12th century scholar Honorius Augustodunensis, also known as Honorius of Autun, was a popular Christian theologian and philosopher. His work, De Imagine Mundi, contains a passage that reads:

"There lies in the Ocean an island which is called The Lost. In Charm and all kinds of fertility it far surpasses every other land, but it is unknown to men. Now and again it may be found by chance; but if one seeks it, it cannot be found, and therefore it is called The Lost."