One interesting theory is that a Dharma Initiative experiment went wrong and a lot of what is going on in the present on the island are repercussions of that incident.

To back up this theory one must believe that the original Orientation film tells a true story. This story being that back in the 70's a group of scientists, workers, and followers chose this island to for social, psychological, paranormal and zoological experimentation. It has been inferred that this island does hold special properties (the magnet build up, etc..) but whether the island always had these properties or if Dharma created them is still an important point to ponder.

At some point after the experiments began, there was an accident that possibly killed the initial members of Dharma. Remember the scene from last season of Sayid comparing the base of the hatch to Chernobyl? This is that such incident/accident. Other results of this may have been that the animals originally locked in the cages escaped, like the polar bears, horses, etc.; Possibly even the shark, although the producers have said the shark with the Dharma logo from early in season 2 was just thrown in there for the fans with HDTV and TiVo.

During this incident, maybe some of the scientists believed that a deadly virus was released, necessitating the quarantine and inoculations (this could be the reason why "the others" may not leave the island, but still have contacts outside). The flip-side of that is that the so-called virus and inoculations were just a lie told to more recent Dharma workers to keep them underground and working in the hatches... Although the audience still doesn't know what killed Rousseau's team.

To bring this theory full circle one must further investigate the crash of Oceanic flight 815. What if the same island properties (think about magnetism) that caused the original accident among the Dharma group is directly related (or the same thing) as the accident caused by Desmond not pushing the button in time the day the Losties crashed on the island. One interesting point Ben made, if he is to be believed, that confuses this theory, regards his comments to Jack that he has lived on the island his whole life. If Ben truly is around the age of 40, that would put Ben on the island years before the Dharma initiative supposedly began.

Along these same lines, if Ben has indeed lived on the island for his whole life, where is his family? Maybe he's a relation to Hanso, maybe not. Hanso could always just be the money behind the island and nothing more. Do any of the other people that were living in the small village on the island with Ben have family? Maybe Ethan or Goodwin or others have brothers, sisters, parents, and children there? Preserving the village and the somewhat ideological lifestyle Ben's group is trying to build would mean they need to repopulate. Children are the beginning. Maybe Walt wasn't that special at all, maybe they just tested him to see how smart he was - to see if he could be educated to be a scientist, a follower, etc... For one commenter below, this brings us to the numbers. If last summers' online Dharma story is indeed directly tied into the Lost storyline, the reason by the numbers is explained at the end of the game/blog/etc...


Questions answered, Questions raised... A reader's attempt at fine-tuning.
Rather than muck up your fine theory, I thought I'd put this down here. :-)

Quote: "At some point after the experiments began, there was an accident that possibly killed the initial members of Dharma." "During this incident, maybe some of the scientists believed that a deadly virus was released..." /Quote
--- If the incident killed the members, where did these virus-fearing scientists come from? If the whole team died quickly, it is unlikely that the outsiders would know about it. If they died slowly enough to get a message out, the outsiders would likely know at least partially what caused the deaths.

Quote: "...animals originally locked in the cages escaped..." /Quote
---The cages are in very fine shape for that to be so (The electrical equipment in Sawyer's cage is still working, too).

Quote: "The audience still doesn't know what killed Rousseau's team." /Quote
---Yes we do. Rousseau. The illness is still unaccounted for. But one must wonder, was there a team to begin with? She is nutters, after all.

Quote: "If Ben truly is around the age of 40, that would put Ben on the island years before the Dharma initiative supposedly began." /Quote
---VERY good point! Of course, he's also a chronic liar...

Quote: "Do any of the other people that were living in the small village on the island with Ben have family?" /Quote
---"One of Us" seems to say otherwise. Women get pregnant, and die before birth.