Leo's Blog Discussion Mega-Thread

[Daniel Balan]

@Leo Gura Thanks a lot for these insights! I'll keep on contemplating on how to better judge human character. From my personal contemplation I figured that it is a mistake to focus on the words and the ideas of people like Trump or Whatifalthist, but rather one should closely examine the engine that drives their speech, their epistemology, their biases, the manner they behave and speak, rather than the substance of their words. Focus on the essence of someone, not their words.

 

 

 

Edited August 22 by Daniel Balan

[Terell Kirby]

@Leo Gura

On cosmic horror:

• Assumes one state beings of being has dominion over another due to sheer vastness .
• Assumes being that’s being dominated by the dominator being can never know that it’s being dominated.
• Assumes there are Infinite ways to be dominated at Infinite degrees of vastness.

Is a Being/Mind ever truly sovereign given these assumptions (let’s just say they are true-hypothetically). Great thought provoking blog post!

 

 

[ZenSwift]

Leo, what substances were you on to access levels of consciousness that you point to as having attributes of "cosmic horror"?! 

 

Regardless, I when I read the post about Cosmic horror, it's a good reminder as to really how much I know about reality is instantly dwarfed by the magnificence of God. 

[Basman]

Scorn is a fascinating game. I haven't seen anyone do Gigger justice before as inspired piece. 

One thing I noticed that these lore aficionados tend to focus on the "hard why" when trying to analyze abstract games like Scorn as opposed to looking at the thematic ques. Like, what is the work to meant to instill in the viewer. When there is no clear answer, I find that lore analyzer types tend to way over-analyze and speculate instead of focusing on the simple conclusions that you can infer from the thematic ques. The parasite at the end seems to be just scornful at the second protagonist and wants to drag him down crab bucket style because it doesn't get to ascend, which fits the theme of the game, of body horror, creepiness, cruelty and reproduction. It is an elitist enlightenment that has been automated in grotesque fashion off the sacrifice of countless and is only available to a certain few. 

Scorn reminds me of Rainworld, which has similar lore of a race of birdmen who also employed biotechnology and to whom enlightenment became an institutional process that their civilization revolved around. 

[Basman]

I also found the point of how god would probably "enjoy" the scorn universe fascinating since it's such a unique and particular way of experiencing consciousness. Saying that it would not "appeal" to humans is such an understatement that it is comical. It's like the world of Scorn is so awful that an entire civilization devoted all of its efforts just to escape it (though in part due to their own machinations it seems). But it is interesting to look at from afar, through a screen. 

Edited August 24 by Basman

[Davino]

Videogame insight:

Just imagine how wild gaming will become once we reach 360° fully multisensory Virtual Reality—where sight, sound, touch, taste and smell pull you completely into a Videogame world.

 

Psychedelic Insight: 

Wait doesn't DMT and Salvia do That?

[Eskilon]

11 minutes ago, Davino said:

Videogame insight:

Just imagine how wild gaming will become once we reach 360° fully multisensory Virtual Reality—where sight, sound, touch, taste and smell pull you completely into a Videogame world.

The final step to total immersion would be total forgetfullness that you are in a videogame. But would you want that?

The cost to perfect illusion is high

Edited August 24 by Eskilon

[UnbornTao]

50 minutes ago, Eskilon said:

The final step to total immersion would be total forgetfullness that you are in a videogame. But would you want that?

Hmm... sounds familiar 

Edited August 24 by UnbornTao

[LambdaDelta]

53 minutes ago, Davino said:

Just imagine how wild gaming will become once we reach 360° fully multisensory Virtual Reality—where sight, sound, touch, taste and smell pull you completely into a Videogame world.

How about you also die IRL when you die in-game?
 

 

[Sugarcoat]

On 2025-07-30 at 4:26 PM, Dazgwny said:

@Leo Gura just a quick one here Leo after reading the blog post on understanding femininity. Not particularly to do with that itself but it reminded me of a video a while back where you said you were still trying to understand exactly what understanding itself actually is, and how it works, as in what is actually going on with understanding anything at all. Just wondered did you ever really get to the root of that, do you have a clear understanding yet, of understanding itself? And is there a video upcoming or in the work just dedicated to ‘Understanding’? It’s something that intrigues me which I don’t think has been covered in depth by you yet. 

And another question that came to my mind recently was “what does understanding lead to?” . Like are we all just running around in a language circle when we contemplate and discuss things, or is it actually leading to some valuable change in our life apart from the temporary satisfaction that some gain from mental understanding?

[Leo Gura]

On 8/23/2025 at 3:42 AM, Terell Kirby said:

@Leo Gura

On cosmic horror:

• Assumes one state beings of being has dominion over another due to sheer vastness .
• Assumes being that’s being dominated by the dominator being can never know that it’s being dominated.
• Assumes there are Infinite ways to be dominated at Infinite degrees of vastness.

Is a Being/Mind ever truly sovereign given these assumptions (let’s just say they are true-hypothetically). Great thought provoking blog post!

You have to confront the depressing reality that many creatures are trapped inside low forms of consciousness, like ants, with no salvation other than death. An ant cannot meditate his way out of his limited condition. Neither can a human.

A difficult reality I had to integrate is that there exist states of consciousness I can never embody no matter how hard I work at it. Effort is not enough.

17 hours ago, ZenSwift said:

Leo, what substances were you on to access levels of consciousness that you point to as having attributes of "cosmic horror"?! 

It can be accessed via any psychedelic.

5-MeO, mushrooms, salvia, DMT, datura can all do the trick. Dreams too.

6 hours ago, Basman said:

The parasite at the end seems to be just scornful at the second protagonist and wants to drag him down crab bucket style because it doesn't get to ascend, which fits the theme of the game, of body horror, creepiness, cruelty and reproduction.

I don't think the parasite was really a parasite but a symbiote, and that it didn't lead to the player's failure. I think that cocoon formed at the end by merging with the symbiote will hatch into the enlightened/ascendant squid-thing. It just takes time.

I read a theory that the final level of Scorn is meant to represent the womb and the doorway was the vaginal opening, and by merging with the symbiote the player becomes a fertilized egg embedded into the womb. Without merging with the symbiote the player would have left the womb unfertilized which would be a failed birth. In this case the Scorn ending is a positive one.

3 hours ago, Sugarcoat said:

And another question that came to my mind recently was “what does understanding lead to?” . Like are we all just running around in a language circle when we contemplate and discuss things, or is it actually leading to some valuable change in our life apart from the temporary satisfaction that some gain from mental understanding?

Leads to God/Love.

Don't look at it as merely mental understanding, it is existential understanding of reality's true nature.

How can you exist and yet ignore understanding your own existence? That can't be the right way to live.

Edited August 24 by Leo Gura

[Sugarcoat]

3 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Leads to God/Love.

Don't look at it as merely mental understanding, it is existential understanding of reality's true nature.

How can you exist and yet not ignore understanding your own existence? What can't be the right way to live.

I see so it’s like it needs a process beyond the mind: like a breakthrough beyond the mind, a drop in the self, etc, for there to be direct knowing of something that later can be conceptualized but most importantly it’s direct awareness of it 

[ExploringReality]

The study of epistemology requires a study of meta epistemology. Epistemology of epistemology. Also a meta epistemology of meta epistemology. 

[Davino]

14 hours ago, LambdaDelta said:

How about you also die IRL when you die in-game?
 

 

Lmaooo

Let's see who are the best Dark Souls players in the world ahahahhaha

[Princess Arabia]

 

 @Leo GuraThese statements seem contradictory. Explain.

Edited August 25 by Leo Gura

[Leo Gura]

29 minutes ago, Princess Arabia said:

These statements seem contradictory. Explain.

Relative vs absolute.

There is nothing wrong with eating rat poison in the absolute sense. But IF you want health, it is wrong to eat rat poison. Rat poison is wrong relative to healthy human life.

[Basman]

16 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

I don't think the parasite was really a parasite but a symbiote, and that it didn't lead to the player's failure. I think that cocoon formed at the end by merging with the symbiote will hatch into the enlightened/ascendant squid-thing. It just takes time.

I read a theory that the final level of Scorn is meant to represent the womb and the doorway was the vaginal opening, and by merging with the symbiote the player becomes a fertilized egg embedded into the womb. Without merging with the symbiote the player would have left the womb unfertilized which would be a failed birth. In this case the Scorn ending is a positive one.

Right before the protagonist is attacked by the parasite (colloquially known as), his consciousness warps back into his original body from the android he was steering. This is probably because the cord between the brain of his body and the nexus was strained too far and severed, like when you rip an electric plug out of its socket. So already there, the protagonist failed in reaching his destination. It is evident from the crucified corpses tethered to the nexus within the chamber that your supposed to leave your original body behind and transcend via an android body. But the protagonist wanted to bring his original body for some reason, and even used the knife arm to keep his body stimulated in order to maintain consciousness until transcendence. But that ruined the ritual, which is when the parasite attacked. 

[Leo Gura]

4 minutes ago, Basman said:

Right before the protagonist is attacked by the parasite (colloquially known as), his consciousness warps back into his original body from the android he was steering. This is probably because the cord between the brain of his body and the nexus was strained too far and severed, like when you rip an electric plug out of its socket. So already there, the protagonist failed in reaching his destination. It is evident from the crucified corpses tethered to the nexus within the chamber that your supposed to leave your original body behind and transcend via an android body. But the protagonist wanted to bring his original body for some reason, and even used the knife arm to keep his body stimulated in order to maintain consciousness until transcendence. But that ruined the ritual, which is when the parasite attacked. 

Yeah, it's needlessly confusing.

It would have been better if there was a clearer conclusion. It would have been more satisfying. We should not have to speculate as to what the point of the journey was.

Edited August 25 by Leo Gura

[Basman]

1 minute ago, Leo Gura said:

Yeah, it's needlessly confusing.

It would have been better if there was a clearer conclusion. It would have been more satisfying.

It could also be that he thought that if he left his body behind, the parasite would sever his connection to the nexus before he managed to reach the gate, but didn't foresee the cord snapping. He was cornered.

But yeah, there is probably no real conclusive answer. Most people I think dislike the ending.

[Basman]

I actually think that the parasite was just mindlessly trying to "reproduce" by melding with the protagonist. It's so feral and it fits the theme of sexual violence in Giggers work. It could be that these "parasites" where meant to be part of the ritual process. There is even a dedicated machine for parasite removal in the temple, but these symbiotes, in this case, would probably be made of moldmen instead of wallmen via the sperm goop. Moldmen are obedient and demure, whereas the first protagonist was a cold bastard evident from his treatment of the moldman at the recycling plant. A moldman parasite would likely be less hostile and disposable.