The Pendulum Effect: Part II

The pendulum effect was first seen on Lost very early on, with Kate swinging between Jack and Sawyer. Now, in season five, the pendulum effect is no longer metaphorical. My latest theory: Those who remain on the island are literally swinging back and forth through time as if riding on a pendulum.

By turning the frozen donkey wheel under the Orchid station, Ben has "unstuck" the island's inhabitants in time, a theme certainly borrowed from Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five. Their first jump was to the past -- before their camp had been built and before the Nigerian plane had crashed. They hike to the hatch and experience another time shift -- now the hatch is long since blown up. Another shift -- the hatch is back. Another shift --the Nigerian plane is overgrown and resting on the Question Mark.

This is where we receive to the key to what is happening. Richard Alpert (he who doesn't age) says to John, "the next time we meet, I won't recognize you." Alpert knows they are on a pendulum, and that John's next jump will be to the past, before they've met. This also explains why they never go back to the time of the dinosaurs, or forward to an unrecognizable future. If they're traveling on a pendulum, it can only reach the same distance to the past as to the future. Each jump is equidistant from a centerpoint. The centerpoint, I believe, is when Desmond turned the fail-safe key and blew up the hatch. An action that unstuck only Desmond -- until that donkey wheel was turned and everyone became unstuck.

So, is the pendulum gaining momentum -- meaning each jump is further back in time and further forward in the future, or losing momentum? It's obviously losing momentum -- because Locke sees the Nigerian plane crash, then goes to the equidistant future and sees the plane resting on the cliff above him (an event not as far back in time as the plane crashing).

In the present, Mrs. Hawkings is furiously charting this effect in her secret laboratory beneath a Los Angeles church (with Tom Cruise keeping Ben company upstairs?). I'm certain she is charting when exactly that pendulum will come to rest. Turns out it's 70 hours from now. What happens then? The Earth stops turning on its axis and we all float off into space (well, technically, we would be thrown into the nearest wall at 1.5 times the speed of sound as our building tips off its foundation). More on that later.