There are all sorts of interesting things to consider about the people that the castaways refer to as “the others”. I’ll start by saying that I currently believe that there are at least two distinct groups of “others” on the island, which I believe are somehow at odds with each other as well as the castaways.
I think one group is with the bearded guy (from the boat, who took Walt) and the other is the “nature lover” group, whose feet we see walking on the path while Eko hides in the bushes. I’m not sure which groups all the “other others” we’ve seen are/were from, like Ethan and Goodwin, although it seems that Ethan did not come from “Zeke”’s group.
Then there are people like Desmond, who I’m really interested in seeing what they do with, since I think he may have been being used by (but not a part of) one or the other (or both) groups of others, or the remaining scientists who may still be around but not a part of either “other” camp described above. Now I think the castaways are in that position of being used/manipulated, whatever the goal may be. It involves keeping them pushing the button somehow, whether that actually does anything useful or whether it’s a part of a larger psychological experiment.
What do you think about the others(A) being bad and others(b) being good? A = Zeke and B = “naturals”.
I think the Aothers are left over scientists or are the scientists behind the whole thing and Bothers are rebels in control of their own thoughts, taking the children for the reason to raise them without the CC in the way. I also believe in what we talked about with the Bothers being in control of the shadow. Or at least I’d like to be since the shadows did take down the plan.
That’s the way it appears right now, but (almost because of that) I hesitate to believe that it’s really the way it is.
I do like the natural others being in control (via the collective consciousness or other means) of the shadow, but it could be a third party altogether, or perhaps even just a programmed AI not under the control (anymore) of any of them.
I do think that the Zeke others fear the natural others for some reason, and the control of the cloud would explain it, but I don’t know. I kind of think that both sets of others have fled from the Dharma organization for different reasons.
Like I said in the other post, I don’t necessarily think either party is good or bad.