No. There is no such thing as a list in scalar context. Lists can only exist in list context. What you have here: scalar (1, 2, 3); is the comma operator in scalar context. Of which man perlop says: Binary "," is the comma operator. In scalar context it evaluates its left argument, throws that value away, then evaluates its right argument and returns that value. This is just like C's comma operator.

Sorry, but that is just (bad) semantics dreamed up (probably long after the fact), to try and explain what actually happens.

Proof: If the comma operator. In scalar context it evaluates its left argument, throws that value away, then evaluates its right argument and returns that value..., then this should print undef or null or nothing, but it doesn't:

c:\test>perl -wle"print scalar(1,2,3,)"
Useless use of a constant in void context at -e line 1.
3
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It's the context that makes the choice - not the function.

Okay. I can agree with that. The function can only chose whether to attempt to return a list, or some more meaningful scalar than the default reduction of that list, that the scalar context would otherwise make.