None of our Losties were meant to be on the flight originally.
The future was changed, someone has been interfering in and changing the past. I think the Others are not keepers of course correction but manipulators of time. They bring people to the island for Jacob. Jacob is all that is left of Dharma and he is still trying to change the ultimate end as predicted by Valenzetti. The end which Dharma ironically caused. He is playing with the variables. Faraday is on the other team which is countermanding Jacob. His job is to discover what Dharma did, study EM, time travel, Constants and Variables. One we have followed all of Faraday’s story we will then be able to rewatch Lost and figure it all out. One we know about Variables it will no doubt be revealed that Jacob was just A Dharma scientist (or Aaron perhaps). There are stories overlapping in Lost as we have been watching a cleverly edited story to look like one continuous time line.
The teams on either side of the war change depending on who is manipulating them. Ultimately it is Jacob on one side and whoever he can manipulate into believing that he is good. Maybe by promising them something, maybe by healing them or maybe granting them what they desire the most. You want your husband dead? No problem he can get hit by a bus. You want to recover from drug addiction – no problem.; want to walk again; recover from feelings of remorse over causing an accident which kills people and you don’t want to see your imaginary friend any more – no problem. Jacob can even cure cancer – go back far enough in time and diagnose it ealy enough with a bit of kemo. Anything’s possible with time travel. The other side is Hawking, Faraday and Widmore along with whoever they can trust has not been manipulated by Jacob. Are the results of the changes in the past only seen on the island or maybe they are all accessable on the island.
Smokey is what instigates those changes. Want Keamy’s men wiped out of existence? No problem – I’ll go back in time and ensure they never come in the first place. Then unleash the monster to wipe them out of this time line.
Hurley may have quite easily have missed flight 815 – we all know that.
Maybe Charlie didn’t catch the plane in one time line either. He wasn't in such a hurry as Hurley. I know that Charlie said “Some of us have a flight to catch!” and then he was obviously ahead of Hurley in getting to the airport since Hurley had to take the stairs and his car broke down. This is not such an obvious example but maybe Charlie was scheduled to take a leter flight originally.
Then we know Sun may or may not have decided to leave Jin.
Sayid was only on the plane because of the police insisting that he leave on that flight after he was involved in some undercover operation to stop terrorists.
Then the reason Kate was on the plane was because a horse ran out into the road. The US Marshall had caught Kate previously, right. She escaped from him and delayed her capture because of that horse, one that strangly appeared on the island. She was only on that flight because he was taking her back to the US.
Clare was on the flight because of Malkin – obviously manipulated since his daughter was brought back to life – another act which also proves that there is manipulation of the past.
Unless you want to explain it my mystic forces. Time travel solves everything. Bad plot for a story? I don’t think so.