I've developed a theory, and I really hope no one has suggested it earlier because I don't mean to plagiarize. The initial thoughts are in another thread.

I believe the passage of time on the Island runs about 10 times slower than in the real world, and here is why I believe this to be true.

In order to keep the series relevant and in tune with our everyday lives, the creators have come up with a way to compress time and keep the series from spanning an impossible timeline.

Take M*A*S*H for example. The Korean War lasted three years, but the series went on for 12??? But the series was set in the past, so it didn't need to keep up with contemporary issues.

But, Lost is different. For some reason, it needs to be tied with the present, but because of production values and limitations, only 16 to 20 weeks' worth of airtime can be shown in a year's time. therefore, the creators have developed a way to manipulate our current passage of time to allow for the discrepancy.

Lost was premiered on 09/22/04 and the third season finale was last week. That's around 970 actual calendar days. The last Island day in the finale was around the 97th day. That makes it a ratio of 10 calendar days to one Island day.

Using this info, Season 4 will begin around 02/08/08. That is 261 days from Season 3's finale air date. Season 4 will last 16 weeks, or 112 days.

That works out to roughly one year, so Season Four will end at the end of May, 2008. Follow me so far?

Season Four will begin where Season Three left off, so say for argument's sake, Day 97. Therefore, Season 4 will cover roughly one calendar year, but given the 10:1 ratio, only ~36 Island days. That means three days will be covered on average per episode.

Therefore, if my theory holds true, when Season 4 ends, ~133 days(11 weeks) will will have elapsed on the Island.

Now, what does this mean?

I don't know. But, can we use this to figure out why pregancies end so horribly on the Island? Is it after the 1st trimester when the mother and child die?

If a normal pregnancy takes 9 months (~270 calendar days), then at a 10:1 time ratio, after ~27 Island days, both the Mother's reproductive system and the fetus itslef may be confused as to the true passage of time and the pregancy is terminated in a very violent and unfortunate way because the gestation has actually taken more calendar days than otherwise would be normal.

So, using this information, how many days do Juliet, Sun, and Kate(?) have to live? According to my theory, not through the entire Season 4.

Any thoughts???