The number 42 by Spiral Nemesis

This theory builds a little bit off of "The Numbers" by 7418880 and also a bit off of H2G2 (The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy).

In H2G2 "a group of hyper-intelligent pan-dimensional beings demand to learn the Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything from the supercomputer, Deep Thought, specially built for this purpose. It takes Deep Thought 7½ million years to compute and check the answer, which turns out to be 42. Unfortunately, The Ultimate Question itself is unknown.

When asked to produce The Ultimate Question, the computer says that it cannot; however, it can help to design an even more powerful computer (the Earth), that can. The programmers then embark on a further ten-million-year program to discover The Ultimate Question. This new computer will incorporate living beings in the "computational matrix", with the pan-dimensional creators assuming the form of mice. The process is hindered after eight million years by the unexpected arrival on Earth of the Golgafrinchans and then is ruined completely, five minutes before completion, when the Earth is destroyed by the Vogons to make way for a new Hyperspace Bypass. This is later revealed to have been a ruse: the Vogons had been hired to destroy the Earth by a consortium of psychiatrists, led by Gag Halfrunt, who feared for the loss of their careers when the meaning of life became known." (Wikipedia)

Now, with all of the literary references in LOST it isn't hard to imagine that the inclusion of the number 42 in the Valenzetti equation was no coincidence. If we take assumption one step further and say that each number is representative of a person or human element then it would seem logical that whoever #42 is will be the answer/key to...well, that part isn't really clear yet, since like in H2G2 we viewers don't really know the question we should be asking.

So who, if anyone, is 42? My guess would be Hurley, as he was the only one Jacob spoke to about the island and why he should return.