(EN/KR)
Dinosaur
Alien
Cemetery
Flower
Programing
Light
Pattern
Ghost
Universe
Paradise
Dogma
Purgatory
Glitch
As a child, dinosaurs were the first beings to instill in me the concept of death. Before bed, my mother would often read me books about dinosaurs. I do not remember the details, but the story must have been about how a meteor collided with Earth, leading to the extinction of the dinosaurs.
I do not even remember if I actually liked dinosaurs back then, but I clearly remember how I reacted. Upon hearing that dinosaurs died, I immediately equated that with the idea that my mother, too, would one day die. “Then will you die too, Mom?” I asked, bursting into tears. My mother held me close and reassured me, “Everyone will die someday, but I'll be by your side for a long time.” That moment has stayed with me ever since.
Much like Bing Bong, the imaginary friend from Pixar’s Inside Out, who continued to cheer for Riley from the depths of her subconscious even after she grew up, I too had something lingering in my mind. Not the dinosaur in a biological or paleontological sense, but something else—some kind of green, reptilian presence. Somewhere deep within my consciousness, it had been preserving the memory of that first conversation I had with my mother about death.
At some point, I played ARK: Survival Evolved quite seriously. It is a game set in an ambiguous timeline—neither clearly prehistoric nor futuristic—where the player starts as a primitive human, hunting, taming dinosaurs, and gradually developing technology to survive.
The first dinosaur I tamed was a dark green Pteranodon. Wherever I went, I could ride it to travel quickly. It carried my heavy loads, and when I fell into deep water and flailed helplessly, it would anxiously try to save me. Sometimes, when I had to enter places where the Pteranodon could not follow, I would leave it in a safe spot and rush through my task, worried about what might happen to it in my absence.
For a long time, I coexisted with the Pteranodon and other dinosaurs, gathering resources and building my own little world. Then one day, while I was logged out, a skilled Chinese player raided my base. Everything I had built was reduced to rubble, and all my dinosaurs were slaughtered.
As I wandered the empty world with a hollow feeling, I came across a Pteranodon identical to mine. It was nothing more than a respawned creature, generated by the game’s algorithm. Its interactions with me had been reset; its memories erased. It was the same in appearance but fundamentally a different being. And yet, rather than feeling empty, I found myself thinking, I hope you live happily in this life. Not long after, I stopped playing the game entirely.
There are moments when a smooth, green-skinned being—something I had long believed to be irrelevant to me—resurfaces from the depths of my subconscious. It emerges through certain triggers, acting as a medium for lost memories and emotions.
If I am experiencing love in the present, then perhaps, in the distant future, I will encounter this love again in a transcendent way. And when that moment comes, something else will serve as its medium. Right now, I cannot recognize it, but somewhere nearby, it lingers like a ghost. And one day, through a seemingly accidental encounter, I will meet that friend.
Since childhood, I have been drawn to aliens, UFOs, and the paranormal. These subjects belong to the realm of fiction, yet they evoke a strangely familiar sensation. Sometimes they feel terrifying, other times intriguing. When people talk about seeing ghosts, I wonder—are they truly glimpsing the spirits of the dead, or are they witnessing something else entirely, something beyond our understanding? Perhaps even ghosts could be a form of extraterrestrial life.
The discussion of extraterrestrial existence has long been a subject of science, philosophy, and popular culture. We search for exoplanets through telescopes, analyze signals, and attempt to determine whether we are alone in the universe. Yet, despite all these efforts, we have not seen them— or perhaps we have, but we lack the means to recognize them.
The idea of extraterrestrial life stirs both fear and curiosity. If they possess a civilization far more advanced than ours, how should we react? Conversely, if they are mere microorganisms, do they still qualify as alien life? More importantly, how much can we truly perceive about the world beyond what is immediately visible?
Carl Sagan believed that extraterrestrial civilizations, if they exist, are likely to be peaceful, and that we should reach out to them. Stephen Hawking, on the other hand, warned that seeking contact with alien civilizations might place us in danger. But beyond the question of extraterrestrial existence, this debate fundamentally reflects how we perceive "the other."
Throughout history, humanity has experienced both fear and fascination toward the unknown. The explorers who first discovered new lands, the sailors who ventured beyond familiar shores, and the astronauts reaching into space all confronted the same dual emotions. This reaction extends to the supernatural—the things we do not understand.
People who claim to have seen ghosts or had inexplicable experiences may simply be victims of illusions or hallucinations. But perhaps these encounters mirror our fascination with aliens—an attempt by our senses to grasp something beyond our comprehension, something that exists on a different plane of reality.
Visiting Parque del Recuerdo Lurín, a cemetery in Peru...
In March 2023, during my first visit to Peru, I was traveling along the highway when a striking landscape caught my attention. In the distance, I began to see an expansive plain filled with vibrant flowers. The sight was so unusual that I felt an overwhelming urge to see it up close, but since I was traveling with others, I couldn't stop. It wasn’t just the abundance of flowers that intrigued me—what made it even more astonishing was that this area belonged to Lima’s desert region, an environment too harsh for flowers to thrive naturally.
In July 2023, I was fortunate enough to visit Peru again. This time, I was determined to go to the place I had missed before. I made time for it and finally arrived. As I walked inside, I was met with an endless stretch of lush green lawns. In front of each grave, bouquets were arranged in a uniform manner, as if reflecting humanity’s desire to regulate not just nature but even death itself. In a space where life continues to grow, the way death was memorialized seemed to follow strict order and discipline.
The unexpected revelation, however, was that most of the flowers I had assumed to be real were actually plastic. The artificial and geometrically structured landscape, which stood in stark contrast to nature, carried an irony that made it a compelling subject for artistic exploration. This experience led me to an intriguing question: How do humans spatially construct life and death? Here, nature had been standardized, geometrically arranged, and transformed into a new kind of landscape to commemorate those who had passed.
At the center of the cemetery stood a statue of Jesus. While honoring a divine presence, the statue also physically occupied an intermediary position between nature and humanity. The palm trees planted throughout the site appeared to be organic elements of nature, yet they were carefully spaced at fixed intervals. This seemed to illustrate humanity’s attempt to convert the inherent irregularity of nature into mathematical order. After all, isn’t mathematics the very tool we use to uncover the mysteries of the universe?
A cemetery is, by nature, a space dedicated to death. Yet, within it, human efforts to preserve and memorialize leave behind traces of life. Despite its meticulously structured layout and rigid arrangement, nature continues to persist, symbolizing permanence in its own way. Grass continues to grow, flowers wither, and the wind blows, introducing disorder into an otherwise controlled space. Within this human-constructed environment, nature asserts its autonomy, creating a constant tension between permanence and transience, order and irregularity.
Undoubtedly, flowers have already been extensively analyzed, romanticized, and poetically depicted by botanists, writers, and artists. Even so, I want to write down my own thoughts about flowers. Perhaps, as with other subjects I have reflected on, what I am about to say has long been recorded in textbooks—outdated, obvious truths that have been discussed for centuries.
And yet, I have felt it firsthand. While cycling for several kilometers, I saw flowers neatly planted along the roadside—the same ones I had seen there last year. Despite the humid heat exceeding 30 degrees, the scent of the Han River mixed with the cool air trapped within the surrounding greenery, brushing past me as I rode by. Those flowers had surely been planted and maintained by someone. Given their location along the Han River bike path, they were likely not the result of personal effort but rather maintained with public funds, sustained by taxes... In that case, perhaps I, too, have a small stake in this flowerbed. So, I might as well enjoy it a little more freely.
Flowers hold many meanings. Think about it—when did we start giving flowers to those we love, using them as a symbol of celebration, and assigning them meanings? Imagine a person in ancient times contemplating how to express attraction to someone they admired. After much thought, he/she might have looked at the flowers spread across a field and exclaimed, “Ah! This is it!” Carefully gathering them one by one, he/she would have created the first bouquet. And surely, it must have been successful. The act of expressing love with a bouquet of flowers must have quickly gained popularity, leading many others to adopt the practice of confirming love through flowers. This is merely a story I imagined, yet the tradition of giving flower bouquets has endured from ancient times to the present, proving its deep and lasting significance.
The act of planting flowers, nurturing them, and harvesting them, or seeking out wildflowers, picking them one by one, and gathering them into a bouquet—all of these are enough to represent sincerity. One might even question, Is expressing sincerity truly such a laborious task...?
I touched a flower bud—so fragile,
yet brimming with life.
Plump, full,
moist, firm,
and still—snap, break.
Mechanical Feelings
I would like to explore a somewhat pessimistic thought: could it be that all actions, decisions, and even hopes of intelligent beings fundamentally originate from the will to survive? This perspective aligns with the idea that survival is not merely about physical continuity but is also deeply tied to the instinct to maintain happiness and well-being.
Expanding on this idea, the way this principle manifests varies depending on the level of intelligence. The simpler an organism, the more instinctively its actions are determined. For example, seeking food, avoiding danger, and reproducing are direct expressions of the survival instinct. However, as cognitive complexity increases, the expression of this instinct takes on more abstract forms. In the case of humans, choosing a career, forming relationships, and exploring philosophical questions may not seem like direct acts of survival. Yet, ultimately, they stem from the same fundamental drive—to sustain life and seek happiness.
This concept becomes even clearer in animals with simpler thought processes. For instance, a predator must hunt to survive, and prey must flee to avoid death. They do not hesitate at moral dilemmas or weigh complex choices; their actions are simple and precise, dictated by the singular goal of survival.
In contrast, human survival instincts become intertwined with emotions, social structures, and intellectual pursuits, making them more complex. People strive for success, seek artistic fulfillment, and ask philosophical questions. Yet, these actions can also be traced back to the fundamental motivation of maintaining life, minimizing suffering, and finding meaning.
If happiness is an evolved mechanism designed to reinforce behaviors beneficial to survival, then the pursuit of happiness is ultimately an extension of the survival instinct. Even self-sacrificial actions can be explained within this framework. A parent protecting their child enhances the likelihood of genetic survival, while an individual dedicating their life to a cause gains psychological fulfillment, which contributes to their mental survival. This suggests that survival is not only a physical endeavor but also a psychological one.
Ultimately, the simpler the thought process, the more clearly the principle of survival instinct is revealed. As cognition becomes more complex, survival strategies diversify, and even behaviors that appear unrelated to survival often serve the same fundamental purpose.
A Cross-Section of Light
Have you seen a city’s nightscape from a bird’s-eye view?
The city is a vast constellation of lights—countless buildings and roads, the glow of car headlights, traffic signals, and endlessly flickering LED billboards... People commuting home by car, those working late in brightly lit office buildings, and travelers heading to the airport for business or leisure. Each of them carries their own stories and contexts. They are parents and children, lovers and friends. And yet, from above, all these individual narratives are blurred into a singular sea of illumination. A city brimming with movement and energy, when seen from a distance, flattens into nothing more than a field of light.
That day, the city was shrouded in fog. By chance, I found myself looking at an LED billboard from the side. When viewed head-on, the billboard presents a coherent visual message—text, images, videos—all perceived as information. But from the side, that information vanished, leaving only scattered particles of light. The tiny water droplets in the air scattered the light, dissolving the original message into fragments of color floating in the mist.
I began to relate this phenomenon to communication and the transmission of information. What we commonly recognize as "information" is structured light—delivered in an organized manner that can be understood as language. But when approached from a different angle—when expressed in an unstructured way or through an unexpected medium—information breaks apart and dissolves. It ceases to be something we can decipher as language and instead transforms into an abstract pattern. And yet, paradoxically, those fragmented pieces of light carried a sense of calmness, simplicity, and even beauty.
Must all information adhere to order? Just as the vast nightscape of Seoul compresses into a single, two-dimensional scene from above, the scattered particles of light create their own form and sensation. Information that cannot be read or interpreted as language still exists in its own right, and at times, new meaning emerges precisely from this disorder.
In the end, even a chaotic scene that we cannot comprehend may become beautiful only when the light that once structured its information loses its order.
Artificial Light
The comfort that night provides is undeniable.
During the day, unnecessary information floods in indiscriminately, sometimes even aggressively. Colors, in particular, feel overwhelming. This reminds me of Chromophobia, a book by David Batchelor, my theory tutor during my time at Goldsmiths University. He argued that colors have often been perceived as foreign, associated with the East, femininity, childhood, vulgarity, or even pathology—leading to a deep-seated cultural aversion. Having spent nearly a decade in the muted, monochrome landscape of London, I found myself unconsciously influenced by a form of civilizational elitism. When the pandemic and my visa expiration forced me to return to Korea—a place teeming with vibrant colors, I became more aware of how much this perspective had shaped me. Adding to that, my identity as a man made Batchelor’s theory feel even more personally relevant. Perhaps that is why it resonated with me so strongly.
For various reasons, I still prefer the night. While it does not grant complete freedom, it allows for a certain level of control over the visual environment. Night becomes a kind of sandbox, a space where things can be shaped with greater autonomy.
Architect Yoo Hyun-jun explored a similar idea from an architectural perspective on his YouTube channel Sherlock Hyun-jun.
“During the day, we have no control over lighting—it is dictated by the sun. That means everyone sitting here, everyone standing on the podium over there, receives the same sunlight. Shadows fall equally on all, making daytime a naturally egalitarian space.
One of the most significant moments in Western art history was when shadows began to appear in paintings. That happened during the Renaissance. It marked the beginning of a shift in how humanity perceived itself—acknowledging human equality, but also human finitude.
Before that, in medieval art, paintings were always centered around God, and shadows did not exist. The compositions were flat, untouched by the passage of time. But with the introduction of shadows, figures in paintings became mortal, finite beings. The problem, however, is that during the day, a dictator and an ordinary citizen both receive the same sunlight. But at night, lighting can be manipulated. Artificial lights can be adjusted—one person alone can be illuminated by a spotlight. You can erect massive pillars hundreds of meters high, all bathed in carefully placed lighting.
That is why dictators must make use of the night.”
Night is also efficient in economic terms. During the day, information must often be conveyed in three-dimensional form, with depth and volume playing a crucial role. But at night, such considerations are no longer necessary. Information can be transmitted effectively in just two dimensions—or even one.
Apophenia
Watching the Netflix series The Queen’s Gambit, I found a particular scene that resonated deeply with my way of thinking. As a child growing up in an orphanage, Beth Harmon learns to play chess and discovers that, at least on the chessboard, she has full control.
“It's an entire world of just 64 squares. I feel safe in it. I can control it; I can dominate it. And it's predictable. So, if I get hurt, I only have myself to blame.”
To Harmon, chess is not merely a game. The real world is chaotic and unpredictable, but within the boundaries of the chessboard, everything follows clear rules. It is the only space where order exists amidst disorder.
In the series, Beth Harmon’s perspective is later explained through the concept of Apophenia—the tendency to perceive patterns and connections in random or unrelated information. Humans are instinctively wired to seek order in chaos, a trait that has led to both scientific breakthroughs and irrational beliefs.
People who experience apophenia find patterns in seemingly meaningless phenomena, uncovering connections that others do not see. This intersection of creativity and cognitive instability has often played a crucial role in groundbreaking discoveries. Newton recognized the law of gravity by observing a falling apple. Leonardo da Vinci found inspiration in the shapes of clouds and waves, incorporating them into his art. Carl Jung studied unconscious patterns, developing his concept of the collective unconscious.
Each of these figures had a relentless obsession with discovering hidden structures in the world, creating new systems of understanding. I, too, find great inspiration in their work. Their way of seeing the world has profoundly shaped my own perspective.
I believe that, like The Matrix, the world operates on patterns and hidden structures waiting to be uncovered. I strive to find these rules, searching for order amidst disorder. This is why I construct my own system, incorporating science, mathematics, religion, spirituality, pseudoscience, and mysticism—not necessarily because each element is empirically validated, but because they serve as tools to interpret reality in a way that resonates with me.
The validity of my findings within established academic paradigms is not my primary concern. More than anything, my pursuit of hidden structures is an instinctive attempt to understand and make sense of the world. Just as Beth Harmon found stability in her chessboard, I find comfort in the order I create within my own worldview.
At its core, my desire to construct a worldview stems from a deeper longing—to extend existence beyond death.
Death is commonly understood as the cessation of existence, the end of both past and future for an individual. However, by establishing my own system, I can create a framework where existence continues beyond death.
In this perspective, death is not an absolute break but rather a transition to another form of connection. My system allows me to explore the possibility of reuniting with those who have already left this world.
For instance, in the reality governed by conventional laws of physics, it is impossible to meet my late mother again. But within this structure I build, that meeting becomes conceivable. By discovering patterns in the world and organizing them in my own way, I seek to expand the meaning of existence itself.
Some may dismiss this as an irrational belief, but then again, don’t SF films thrive on such ideas? Didn’t Elon Musk invest heavily in the idea of reaching Mars, driven by nothing more than the sheer desire to make it possible? Verification is important, but for me, this is not merely about proving something—it is an earnest expression of hope.
As I drove down the highway at dawn, my gaze lingered on the mountain ridge. The sky, tinged with a bluish hue, and the pitch-black mountains did not appear three-dimensional but rather flat. At that moment, an experimental piece of music began playing from a playlist that had initially started with traditional Korean music, now shaped by an algorithm into an eerie, elongated string sound. The atmosphere grew more unsettling. What if, in that ink-black mountain, ghosts were densely gathered, silently watching me?
The darkness rendered the mountain into a flattened image, leaving me alone to confront it. The thought of being alone allowed me to feel fear. That fear made me sense the presence of beings from another dimension. And in that realization, I was no longer alone.
“It is only when alone (that is to say, in the presence of someone) that the infant can discover his own personal life.”
— Donald W. Winnicott
“The universe is a relationship,
and a relationship is love.”
— Seung Mo Yang
“Ο”, “∞”, “Ω”, “”
The universe expands, and it possesses finite resources. Entropy influences everything—from Earth to the solar system, to galaxies, and even beyond what can be imagined—following the rigid flow of time governed by strict physical laws. If the universe is viewed as an isolated system, then one day, when the transfer of energy ceases, the expanding universe will reach its maximum entropy and quietly meet its end, much like a burned-out light bulb. Everything will come to a halt, motionless, with even time itself frozen in an immense void of darkness.
When the expansion of the universe ends and inflation ceases, the heat death will arrive, stripping infinite space of its meaning until, ultimately, it collapses into 0. The moment when the infinite suddenly condenses into a single point. And from this point, theories about the fate of the universe diverge—some propose that a new Big Bang will occur, birthing another universe, while others suggest that the universe will contract and return to its origin. I tend to lean toward the latter. When the universe reaches its end, it merely rewinds back to its beginning, and time flows in reverse. In a universe where time moves backward, beings may appear to be living in reverse from our current perspective, but in their world, that direction is the natural forward motion. Eventually, the universe will once again reach the Big Bang, returning to the same cycle, repeating indefinitely. It is the eternal recurrence described by philosophers, the reincarnation spoken of in Buddhism—perhaps operating on a physical level.
If this is the case, then what is the distinction between birth and death? If what we perceive as death in our universe is birth in the reverse universe, and what we consider birth is its disappearance, then they converge at the same point. I am reminded of Jesus’ words: love even your enemies. There is a moment when all things merge into one—0. A point where the boundary between self and other, all forms of opposition, vanish. Just as ‘you’ cannot exist without ‘me,’ the very notion of an individual identity collapses at this threshold.
Death is the moment when consciousness disappears, and in the reverse universe, that moment is birth. The death in the reverse world passes through time until it reaches the Big Bang, leading once again to the birth of our universe, and this cycle repeats endlessly. And through death, the incomprehensibly long stretch of time—from the arrival of the heat death to the moment of my death in the reverse universe—can be skipped in a state of nothingness. In this sense, death is not an end, but a mere blank space. Or perhaps, it is not even substantial enough to be called a blank space—just a fleeting pause until the universe needs me again.
But accepting this cycle as it is and breaking free from it are two entirely different matters. Nirvana is not simply passing into nothingness after death. True liberation lies in escaping this endless cycle of expansion and contraction. Nietzsche claimed that even within the eternally recurring life, humans could break free through sheer madness. He called the one capable of such defiance the Übermensch, while Buddhism refers to this as enlightenment. If one seeks to escape this endless repetition, it is not enough to pass through the state of nothingness—one must transcend the very dimension of existence itself.
A friend I spoke with about this put it another way: we have only been perceiving the universe from a three-dimensional perspective. It is not simply about moving into the fourth dimension, but rather understanding dimensions beyond that, where true enlightenment may be possible. As long as one remains trapped in three dimensions, the universe appears as an endlessly repeating wheel. However, from a higher-dimensional perspective, what seems like mere repetition may take on an entirely different form.
This brings to mind the concept of the Flatlander. Those living in a two-dimensional world cannot fully comprehend a three-dimensional object. Imagine a perfect sphere in three-dimensional space. To a Flatlander, it would first appear as a single point. As the sphere passes through their plane, they would perceive it as a growing circle, which would eventually shrink back down to a point before disappearing. To them, it would seem as though the sphere had simply appeared and vanished, yet from a three-dimensional perspective, the sphere never ceased to exist. Likewise, what appears to be an endlessly looping cycle in my three-dimensional perspective might, from a higher dimension, reveal an entirely different structure.
So is there a way to perceive this 0 moment from the present, without experiencing death? Perhaps enlightenment is not merely about escaping repetition but transcending the pattern while still alive. If one could view the world from the perspective of 0, one would not merely break from the continuity of time but understand all existence as a singular whole. If there is a way to experience this cosmic cycle while remaining free from it, then that may be the closest thing to true transcendence.
In the end, the cycle of the universe will always return to 0. And in that moment, all things will become one. Existence does not vanish—it simply flows into another form. Birth and death, beginning and end, are ultimately part of a singular stream. We may not perceive it, but that does not mean it is not happening.
One can imitate knowledge and mistake it for truth. But I do not want to accept a false awakening as enlightenment. Escaping the worldly realm is still difficult. There are too many things that feel important in the present—emotions, relationships, the inertia of cause and effect. It is not easy to completely step out of this cycle. For now, I think I will just live as a Flatlander.
Reading Yun Dong-ju’s The Self-Portrait: 'The Poet’s Well
A person does not grow in stagnant waters. Growth comes not from staying still but from the relentless interference of new things. Yet, at some point, one must sever all ties and stand alone. Whether they were allies or adversaries, whether they shaped me or defined me, I must let them go. Even if that means breaking away from the one who brought me into this world. Even if that means breaking away from myself. Only then can I truly grow.
Just as spring fades into autumn, those who once stood beside me fall away one by one, like leaves drifting to the ground. Lone wolf.
In the end, life is lived alone. That’s what they say. But it only becomes real when I find myself standing in solitude. I am like Adam and Eve, cast out of paradise and abandoned in the wild. I gather fallen leaves, hastily crafting a mask to cover myself. Because my bare self—my real self—is unbearable to look at. Embarrassingly flawed.
And so, we call ourselves outcasts. The masks we created to hide begin to consume us, growing so large that we forget where our true selves even exist. In the pursuit of greatness, I begin to despise being myself. The roles have reversed. The singularity approaches. And yet, it feels oddly comforting, as if this was always meant to be.
But is this really a happy life? Is this truly love? No matter how I look at it, there’s nothing hopeful about it. The mask must come off. I have to walk this cold, damp, and miserable path to the very end before I can see the light. And I believe—without a shadow of doubt—
That when the light finally envelops me, when I turn back to look at the road I’ve traveled, those who once cheered for me from the darkness will reveal themselves at last. And as they watch me, having endured it all, they will smile with quiet satisfaction.