We know the work is mysterious and important. We know Lumon proports to “heal the world” - but of what? We know Kier Eagan founded this company on a basis of his deep disdain for The Four Tempers and impurity of the body. He was clearly traumatized by his childhood illness as depicted in PAINTING NAME. But what, indeed, does Lumon, as a whole, do?

Kier Eagan is overt in his philosophy (as recorded in Compliance) of purity of spirit, veins, soul, what have you. The company started as a topical salve maker and their old and new logos are consistent with some kind of liquid/viscous product still being a core part of the business. Jame Eagan, the current CEO at the end of season 1, wears a signet ring with the original company logo on it. One can presume this ring ics ceremonially passed down or made anew for each incoming CEO, much like a duchy's crest is worn by the current duke.

Lumon also has business with water purification (See canon lore on Tumwater) and there is the emphasis on the Soap and The Bad Soap on the severed floor. Imogen's is a soap and bath goods shop named for Kier Eagan's wife Imogen who herself cleaned ether vats when they met. Harmony Cobel pretends to run a shop she does not name but the products she speaks of such as bath bombs are consistent with Cobel pretending to run Imogen's. Cleanliness and purity are recurring themes of Kier Eagan's philosophy.

In keeping with that origin story, the Severance procedure takes on a new and omninous tone. If indeed the goal is to wipe away the outie memories of a worker, leaving their minds pure and focused only on Lumon's goals and work, that is a perversion of Kier's more personal/psychological desire to rid himself of troublesome feelings. The technology to utterly wipe a person's memory may be what is being tested on the testing floor.