The Island

While many of the island's mysteries fall outside the realm of Physics, there are a few key points that Daniel is likely to explore. This post will likely get broken up into several separate posts

1) The 'Built-up Magnetic Field', the release of which is the purpose of the button during season two. I recall a recent experiment (though lack a link or proper name for it) that involved building up an extremely high current using super-cooled wires (to allow super-conductivity). Electric currents produce a magnetic field proportional in strength to the current. If one suddenly stops the current, the change in magnetic field can have an explosive effect in the release of electromagnetic radiation.

I regard the island's behavior somewhat similarly, though coming up with a physically sound explanation is difficult.

2) The reflection of light. Daniel comments about the light bending strangely on the island, or at least in that specific location. This may be related to the island's magnetic properties, as magnetic fields can influence the behavior of light.

3) Time-shifting. The obvious physical explanation for the behavior of the clocks is time dilation, the special relativistic effect on time when an observer is moving at significant fractions of the speed of light (which is the 'speed limit' of the universe).

The more logical explanation is that time flows differently on the island. However, if the time moved at different speeds than the real world, communicating with the freighter with real-time speech would be impossible, as their voices would either be compressed or elongated. However, that could be fixed with proper equipment that filters ingoing and outgoing communications on one end.