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“Life is never taken for granted.
“Everyone who is alive and breathing at this moment is a miracle.”

Forensic pathologist Lee Ho tells us how he sees life from death.
Some stories of death and the meaning of life

Professor Lee Ho, a renowned reader, a forensic pathologist who encounters death every day, and a cheerful person like no other, tells us about 'Stories of Death' and reflects on the meaning and value of life.
Professor Lee Ho, who is a forensic pathologist consulting for “I Want to Know That” and is also familiar to the public through programs such as “Know-It-All” and “You Quiz,” said, “If you want to live well, you have to learn about death,” and published his first book, “Death Lessons for the Living.”
Having performed autopsies on approximately 4,000 dead bodies over the past 30 years, he tells the 'true meaning of life' through the stories of various deaths he has encountered in this book.

Sometimes, we feel lost about what it means to live, and we dream of a better tomorrow than today, but it can be difficult to find the way.
And sometimes, there are days when we suddenly feel anxious about the loss and death that will come to us someday.
That's when we have to learn about death.
The reason why the everyday life we ​​let slip by without a second thought is precious, the reason why we must love the people around us who exist as if they were a given, is because the answer can be found in death, not in life.
Among the real stories of death that are more interesting than 'All the Butlers' and more curious than 'I Want to Know That', the story of life that only a forensic scientist can tell unfolds warmly and movingly.

At 9 o'clock in the morning, we enter the underground autopsy room.
The body of a man in his 40s, whose autopsy was suddenly scheduled late yesterday afternoon, lies on the autopsy table.
I said 'suddenly', but I don't think it's appropriate.
What death is not sudden?
Before the autopsy begins, you will receive a brief briefing about the case from the police officer in charge and the coroner.
This body was found drowned, and the cause of death must be determined as soon as possible, so the autopsy team and I are quickly starting preparations.
--- From "The Doctor You Meet at the Last Moment of Life"

All forensic scientists, like myself, follow the Ten Commandments of career choice.
These are people who willingly walked to a place with low wages, few opportunities for promotion, a wasteland with few people wanting to come, a place where their parents and wives were strongly against it.
These are people who chose to be where they are needed rather than where they want to be, people who chose to be where the guillotine awaits them rather than the crown.
The person who risked his life to reveal that the cause of death of Park Jong-cheol, who said, “I was hit with a hammer and died,” was torture, was actually forensic pathologist Hwang Jeok-jun.
If you think about it, there has never been a time in our society when forensic scientists sided with state power.
If he was someone who tried to deceive his conscience in the face of power and capital, he would not have chosen this path in the first place.
--- From "Visible Lies and Invisible Truths"

We believe that we are safe because we are alive like this now.
We believe that we deserve to be alive because we are righteous and perfect.
So we unconsciously think that someone's death is caused by that person.
If someone dies in an accident or a crime, the first thing we try to do is find the cause in that person's negligence.
We, who are perfectly attentive and careful, believe that we are safe, as it only happened because he was careless, or because someone next to him was immoral.
I want to believe that.
That way, I can control my anxiety under the illusion of safety.
But we don't actually know how close we are to danger.
We never want to acknowledge that death can strike us anytime, anywhere.
--- From "No one heard the groans that day"

Then, suddenly, I remembered the nine-year-old girl I met in the autopsy room today.
The mother discovered that her second daughter, who she thought was asleep with her older sister, did not wake up.
Saying goodbye all night isn't just something that adults do.
Meeting the mother and father of a child who left without saying goodbye after the autopsy is more heartbreaking than any other autopsy.
When a child dies suddenly, judicial authorities must force an autopsy to determine the possibility of child abuse.
Although it is a necessary process for the children, it is a painful moment for the forensic scientist who has to explain it while also considering the psychological trauma caused to the parents.
With the explanation that sudden death occurs in about one or two out of 100,000 people worldwide and the cause is still unknown, and that there is no way to know in advance or prevent it, my role as a parent is to be as considerate as possible so that parents do not blame themselves.
--- From "How Much Should I Grieve the Death of a Loved One?"

The answer may vary from person to person, but I would like to say that there is only one answer to this question.
It's not the best swimmer or the person with the most time who can save a drowning child.
The only correct answer is 'the first person to see the drowning child.'
We must jump in immediately without hesitation.
You must have been so busy running to the child that you didn't even see the second or third person coming.
The 'water' referred to in this thought experiment is not actually the water in a rippling pond.
It is a cold world where children are struggling, abused, neglected, and abandoned.
--- From "Who Should Save a Child Who Fell into Water?"

The fact that humans die is unchangeable, although it may be a little early, a little slow, or the method may be different.
So, I hope you don't spend your life trying to find answers to the tragedy that happened to you, asking, "Why did this happen to me?"
Because the answer to that absurdity cannot be found.
It must be so painful and difficult, but I hope you can somehow find meaning in living through it.
That is the most active resistance that humans, who are like dust living in the infinite universe, can do.
--- From "On the Search for Meaning in Life"

Typically, a single incident that results in three or more deaths is considered a major disaster.
This refers to incidents that result in tens or hundreds of casualties due to causes such as fire, explosion, collapse, fall, sinking, and natural disasters.
When a major disaster strikes, people often think that rescue workers, medical personnel, firefighters, police, and soldiers are all involved, but there is another essential resource: forensic pathologists.
Because we need to find the body and identify it.
Especially in cases of fire, explosion, building collapse, or airplane crash, the body is often so disfigured that it is impossible to identify the body with the naked eye, making the role of a forensic scientist crucial.
So, while forensic scientists are usually 'people who find the cause of death', at this time they become 'people who find people'.
Although it was a secondment to gain experience before becoming a full-time forensic scientist, Sampoong Department Store became my first forensic field site.
--- From "Even a Tiny Piece"

I have been working as a forensic scientist for nearly 30 years and have performed approximately 4,000 autopsies.
People who died in fires, people who decomposed in water, people who were horribly damaged in car accidents, people who were stabbed to death in fights, people who died from being beaten so much…
I saw the bodies of people who died in vain for various reasons.
But such horrific injuries are not traumatic to me at all.
The real trauma, the trauma that I still can't forget even after all these years, is the corpse that had no damage to any part of its body.
Even I, who have seen corpses for over 30 years, was speechless from the shock of that day. These were the 299 corpses that were the cleanest.
The first thing that struck me when I saw the bodies recovered from the Sewol ferry was that all of the victims were wearing life jackets.
--- From "About the 299 Cleanest Corpses"

Even looking at the Sewol ferry disaster, the arrows of criticism were directed at one individual.
At first, criticism was focused on Captain Lee Jun-seok, who had driven the ship, but as the investigation progressed, the target shifted to Chairman Yoo Byeong-eon, known as the real owner of Cheonghaejin Marine.
The situation unfolded as if this accident would not have happened if it weren't for Captain Lee Jun-seok and Chairman Yoo Byeong-eon.
Of course, they are clearly at fault.
But is that really the entire cause of the disaster? In a healthy society, even if there were a hundred people like Yoo Byung-eon, this kind of accident wouldn't have happened.
There needs to be more robust safeguards in place to prevent such people from committing wrongdoing, or even if they do commit wrongdoing, to prevent it from resulting in the sacrifice of hundreds of children.
A society that is completely devoid of holes due to just one requirement is clearly problematic.

--- From "The Ship Will Sink Again"