Explaining the apparent difference in on and off Island time on Lost.

Just yesterday I had another conversation regarding what happens when traveling to and from the Island in season 4. So now that I have a blog, I thought I would use this to explain why there appears to be a difference, but really there is not.


Now, in season 4 we have 3 examples of objects traveling to and from the Island which SEEM to imply that time flows at a different rate. This is a mistake of perception as Daniel Faraday points out. The three examples are as follows.

1) Daniel's experimental rocket from the freighter.
2) Desmond, Sayid and Frank's trip to the freighter.
3) Doc Ray's body arriving on the Island, before he was killed on the freighter.

Now, with these three examples, we can form a hypothesis. Namely, that time does not flow differently, but rather that objects coming to or leaving the Island's radius can experience temporal displacement. We know this for a few reasons. First however, let's get into the effects seen in each of these three examples.

1) Daniel's rocket arrives on the Island roughly half an hour later than it should have.
2) The helicopter arrives about a day and a half late, however those on the helicopter only experience the passage of 20 minutes.
3) Doc Ray's dead body washes up on the Island quite some time before he's actually killed on the freighter.

Now, if there were an actual time difference between on and off Island time, the effects should be consistent. In that objects traveling to the Island should experience the opposite effect of objects traveling from the Island. But that isn't the case. As is shown with Daniel's rocket coming to the Island and the helicopter leaving the Island experience the same effect. While Daniel's rocket and Doc Ray's body experience opposite effects.

This means that the problem isn't with the flow of time on or off the Island, but rather, somewhere in between temporal shifting occurs. And Daniel gives us a big clue towards this end when he tells Frank that he must stay on a very specific heading when traveling back and forth.

We find out that when one goes off that course, an object is subject to temporal shifting. While Frank is flying the chopper towards the freighter, Desmond becomes unstuck in time(an issue I may discuss in a future post), which causes Frank to lose his focus and go slightly off course. This causes them to be shifted forward in time by about a day and a half, while not experiencing any extra time themselves.

Questions and comments welcome, but I think this should clear up the whole "time discrepancy" issue once and for all.