作為海洋沉思者，廖鴻基不同於一般世俗討海人的是，他是以「透視」的眼光，亦即存在的關切進入海洋中，因此，從討海人到鏢魚船上的鏢手，從撒網到出鏢，彷彿是在通過一個個海洋所設立之門檻，也像在尋求一種更真切、深刻的自我理解與表達，討海人的每一次漁獵戰鬥，都成了一場場以直面海洋，來沖擊陸地僵滯困局的生之戰鬥，唯跨過了海洋設下的重重門檻，唯一步步地融入／回歸她的懷裡，成為一條魚，才能以「成為一條魚的討海人」之姿，取回這條寶貴的魚：自己。
因此，對討海人言，當船航入海，便如身體的直接航入海，澎湃海潮、陷阱暗流、魚獸兇猛、天候瞬變，當無所依憑的討海人起身站立，且向著大海撒網的同時，便將自己直接撒入了變動不測的海洋宇宙中。巨浪、漩渦、險溝、暗流，一一都是生存的隱喻，也是戰場之所在。因此，以「海洋戰鬥」隱喻「生存戰鬥」 ，討海人之戰，航行的本身，直接衝擊了視域疆界下的慣性／陸地思維。對廖鴻基言， 「戰」是討海人所以為討海人的本質與實踐，它是一段突圍「無法融於海／無法成為一條魚／無法成為自己」的生之戰鬥旅程，而此一以「戰」來「融入海」的旅程，亦便是一段重新與生命源頭連結，亦即重新找到人之於世界，之於整個宇宙位置的歷程，這是僵固視域之突圍，生命困絕之解脫，死與再生的轉化契機，亦是生命的重新恢復其流動的歸家之路。

Having distinguished himself from general secular fishermen, Liao Hong-Ji, as an ocean thinker, gets involved in the ocean based on the existential concern. Therefore, the course of being from fishermen to harpoon man of harpoon boat or from casting net to shooting harpoon is as if it passes through the threshold established based on the ocean, and it feels like searching for a vivid and profound self-understanding and expression. All of fishermen’s fishing efforts become the fight for life of stagnation and predicament on land, as only striding over the thresholds of ocean and harmonizing into/returning to her bosom step by
step to become a fish can this precious fish, self, be retrieved in the posture of “Becoming the fishermen of a fish.”
For fishermen, fishing vessels with their sails set into ocean as if the physical body sets sail on the sea. Billows, whirlpool, deep sea trench and undercurrent are metaphors of existence, i.e. the battlefield. For Liao Hong-Ji, “fight” embodies the essence and practice of
fishermen, as it is one journey of fighting life to break through the barriers of “being unable to harmonizing into the ocean/being unable to be a fish/being unable to be yourself.” Such journey harmonizing into the ocean with “fight” signifies a course of reconnection with the origin of life, the course of rediscovering man’s position in the world and the entire cosmos, as it means circulation of vision, the extrication of predicament of life, and the critical point of transformation of death and rebirth that means helping life recover to circulating healing,
homecoming.