Two more times than ita, then.

Tired of breathing, have we?

Also, a big damn WORD to JZ for his wonderful summation of what is fucked up about Locke as a person (and wonderful about Locke as a character), especially:

Locke's agenda is known to Locke alone. Interact with him and you're either playing into it or thwarting it all unawares (in fact, if it turns out that he was the one who clocked Sayid, you can be going about what you believe to be totally neutral business entirely unconnected to him and still thwart him and bring a thumping upon yourself without having any idea how or why). His agenda is both so purely internal and so vastly big-picture that there's no guaranteed safe way to guard against it or even make an informed choice to assent to it.

ita, Locke used Charlie as boar bait in The Moth.

a big damn WORD to JZ for his

(psst, tavela, JZ is a her)

Locke used Charlie as boar bait in The Moth.

I have a near-complete block on that episode. Can you give me context? I'm assuming it wasn't part of his "just say no" program.

Hey, tavella, are you Tavella on TWoP? The one who helpfully posted someone's Fuselage translation of Jin's dialogue with Hurley? If so, thanks. It doesn't sound like he's fluent either.

Also, ha! He did say something mean.

I have a near-complete block on that episode. Can you give me context? I'm assuming it wasn't part of his "just say no" program.

There was a scene where Charlie was running away from something, and it turned out he was being chased by a boar in order to lure the boar into one of Locke's handy boar traps. Back when they were all buddy-buddy.

Well, he sure didn't tell Charlie he was doing it. He said, "Charlie, I need your help with something."

Then he was nowhere to be found. Charlie hears some rustling. Then he starts running for his life. The boar gets caught in a trap/net.

There's no way an herbalist is going to have as much medical value as a surgeon. I'm not saying she's not valuable - but applying basil to a severed artery is not going to be as effective as somebody who can sew it up.

I'm still unclear on how a surgeon without any instruments managed to sew up a bleeding artery. Because, need a curvy needle and some really strong thread -- did they unwind heavy-grade thread from around coat buttons? Do people flying from Australia even take their coats with them? I'll grant that he has the expertise to sew up a bleeding artery, but the tools are what I'm talking about.

The most useful aspect of Jack's medical expertise, right now, is psychological: everyone seems to think, "Yay, doctor," and presume a certain level of civilization safety net. Which illusion will be punctured by the first Lostite who comes down with appendicitis, because anybody watching a doctor improvise abdominal surgery outdoors, with a hunting knife, some alcohol for sterility, and no anaesthetic -- they'll change their minds about how strong the safety net feels.

You'll notice there are no diabetic Lostites, or heart patients, or anyone with a chronic ailment who needs regular medication to survive. Because, even if they had been cast, they'd be dead by now.

The obvious explanation, given all he's seen and experienced, is not that he has a faulty compass, but that there is, in fact, a significant magnetic whosit, most likely coming from the mysterious power source that must exist somewhere on the island.

Going back to the "faulty compass." Not faulty. Nor is a huge chunk of metal necessary to produce that much magnetic variation, though it could. It's one of the ways the Navy detects submarines, with a device known as MAD (Magnetic Anamoly Detector). Take a look at this map. Scroll all the way down to the bottom two maps. Take a look at the mid-Pacific Ocean and what do you see? The magnetic variation of north runs nearly parallel to the equator. Practically a full 90 degrees of declination. And then it reverses itself 180 degrees the other direction, but still parallel to what we think of as east-west. There's even finer tuned maps that pilots of P-3s use when hunting for subs using MAD. You have to know what the actually magnetic variance is at any one location to know if a huge chunk of metal, such as a sub, is throwing it off.

This is why one of my first objections to the scene was a baffled "But...but.."

Shouldn't Sayid know that the compass has deviations? He's military trained. No reason the RG would omit basic map training.

Plus? the sun does not set in the exact West unless you are on the Equator during the equinox. Almost everything else depends on your relationship with the tilt of the earth. Knowing the approximate latitude you are at, and the time of the year would help.

The magnetic variation of north runs nearly parallel to the equator. Practically a full 90 degrees of declination.

The lines of declination shown are isogonic, not directional. They don't show the direction to magnetic north, they link points where the angle between true north and magnetic north is the same.

I'm with Sayid in mistrusting Locke's compass, at least until further tests are done. If the island is near the equator, checking accurately against the stars with no reference information will be difficult.

I also mistrust Jack's estimation of west -- even if he remembered accurately where the sun had gone down the night before, the sunset azimuth varies considerably with the season. And I've learned from experience both hiking and flying that people frequently mis-estimate a ninety-degree turn when they try to measure it with the "point straight ahead, then point to the side" method. They usually end up about 20 degrees short.

So there are lots of ways errors can creep in. I think the point of the whole bit is "This place is weird. Locke is weird. Don't trust either one."

late edit: because I finally remembered the correct term is "isogonic."