Jan 8, 2008

Ockham

Now, we all know that the LOST writers love to name their characters by philosophers and other scientists from history. Personally I think it gets boring, because it seems that they don't give characters names by scientists which they resemble anymore (like John Locke, the eternal empiricist), but just name them randomly. Anyway, the name of the captain of Christine I is Ockham. I recognised it immediatelly as probably referring to William of Ockham, the XII/XIII century philosopher). On wikipedia there is a quite interesting article about his work, and it can be read here. I wouldn't go into all of his work right now, but only into this:
He is famous for his theory called "Ockam's razor", which says that "things (entities) should not be multiplied beyond necessity", or in translation "The simplest solution tends to be the best (right one)". There is also an elaborate wikipedia article on that, here.

So, I think it could mean two things that they named the captain Ockham. The first one would be that it will play a role in the future of the story (either of the game or the show), or that the writers are laughing at us fans for looking too much into some details and making it sometimes too complicated. But one thing's for sure - they didn't name him Ockham by accident.

3 comments:

Gregor Vuga said...

Funnily enough, I heard his last name as Arkham. You know, the Lovecraft one.

Unknown said...

'ake!' I DO believe that the captain's name is important (weather that plays out in-game or in-series is something to be determined). The idea that the producers/exsecutives are 'laughing at us' is compeling, but I, honestly think that that kind of ridicule would be saved for a podcast ;) .
The Ockham reference is very influential in the plot, I think. I could elaborate, but that's for another post ;)

btw- Red Moose, if you activate subtitles you will see it displayed as 'Okcham' (just go into your settings at the bottom of find815 and turn on sub's)

Миљан Давид Танић said...

Yeah, subtitles can spare us quarrels like "either" vs "neither"...
Anyway... monk satyr, they spent a whole EPISODE ("Expose") mocking us... why not mock us in the game, too? :D