🌫️ The Death of Nuance

Why We Optimize for Simplicity Over Completeness — Plus, Crude Oil Prices Skyrocket as Mideast Conflict Escalates

Author

Katie Perry
June 14, 2025

Welcome to Tuesday Thursday Saturday! I share a snapshot of trending stories across business, tech, and culture three times a week. Subscribe and tell me what you want to hear about next! - KP

The Big Story: How Nuance Became Such a Rare Commodity

I’ve been told, more than once, that I tend to see things in black and white and miss the shades of grey in between. The thing is: I like clarity. A clear good guy, a clear bad guy, a comprehensive, logical answer, and a nice, neat conclusion where everything makes sense. And, scene!

That’s just not how things are, though.

Trying to find the simplest possible explanation or answer is the default mode for many of us, and that’s because we’re hard-wired that way. It makes sense that we would want to isolate the most clear-cut articulation of an otherwise complex topic. Compounding our biological tendencies is the fact that we’re unfortunately living in a culture that seems allergic to that kind of complexity.

Nuance is hard. It’s hard to sit with ambiguity. It’s hard to hold two contradictory truths in your mind at the same time. It’s hard to listen to someone you disagree with and resist the urge to label them as either entirely right or completely wrong. All of it creates discomfort, and most of us are conditioned to steer away from that.

From a psychological perspective, our brains are designed to avoid nuance. There’s something called need for cognitive closure, which is the human tendency to want a quick, definitive answer. This made sense for survival. You don’t want to sit around deliberating when the bear is coming. But in modern life, where most “threats” are ideological or interpersonal, that instinct can backfire. It makes us susceptible to binary thinking. Good vs. evil. Right vs. wrong. Hero vs. villain. Simplicity is seductive. But often, it's a lie.

On top of that, there’s our digital environment. Social media platforms reward outrage. Algorithms push polarizing content because it drives engagement. The more extreme the take, the more visibility it gets. Cable news operates the same way. You’ve got three minutes of airtime to make your point, so you pick a side, you double down, and you package your opinion like a weapon. It’s emotionally effective, but intellectually flawed.

John Stewart’s appearance on “CNN Crossfire” in the 1990s has recently re-emerged as people across the political spectrum applaud his hilariously spot-on critique of cable news. It’s a must-watch.

We’re encouraged to think in headlines. To share bite-sized judgments. To immediately attack, respond, or defend, instead of reflect. And so, even well-meaning people lose their taste for nuance. Because in the economy of attention, being careful isn’t compelling. If Elon Musk’s X platform is sending cash payments to creators for high-engagement content, of course, people will be incentivized toward rage-bait.

Rage-bait: To increase online engagement (e.g., views, comments, shares) by provoking a strong reaction, usually anger.

Philosophers have long explored and debated this very topic. Socrates, for example, literally built his method on asking questions. The aim was not to win, but to deepen understanding. Aristotle talked about the “Golden Mean,” or the idea that virtue often lives in the balance between extremes. And Albert Camus, in all his existential angst, argued that life is absurd and contradictory, and our job is to live meaningfully anyway. That sort of philosophical humility — the willingness to admit that the world is rarely clean or conclusive — is something I’ve been trying to channel more of.

And here’s where it gets real. The inability to hold nuance doesn’t just affect our views on politics or media. It seeps into our relationships.

We judge people based on a single moment. We define coworkers by one email. We assume intention where there might just be miscommunication. And on the flip side, we sometimes stay stuck in cycles because we over-intellectualize or refuse to take a stance. (“Well, there are two sides to everything…” Actually, there are likely hundreds if not thousands of “sides.” But not all sides are morally equal.)

Along this line of thought, politics might be where we feel the cost of black-and-white thinking the most. So many issues get framed in false binaries when real life is messier. That’s why more people are pushing for things like ranked-choice voting. It’s a tool that makes room for complexity, forcing us to prioritize and compromise instead of defaulting to extremes. It’s not perfect, but it reflects the reality that we’re often choosing among imperfect options. And that’s okay.

So, how do we build more nuance into our thinking without becoming morally ambiguous, spineless, or stuck in indecision?

Experts say one of the most practical ways to invite nuance back into your thinking is to slow down and zoom out. Ask yourself: what don’t I know? What’s the broader context? Research from the University of Michigan suggests that taking a wider perspective increases empathy and reduces knee-jerk judgment. That starts with identifying your mental shortcuts, like confirmation bias, negativity bias, and attribution error.

Sometimes what feels obvious is just what’s familiar. And sometimes the most mature move is admitting: “I don’t know enough yet.” That pause before posting, texting, or deciding is a muscle worth building. (I am comically bad at this.)

It also helps to upgrade your language. Try swapping “but” for “and.” That small shift opens the door to complexity: “This idea has flaws and I still see its value.” Having a nuanced perspective doesn’t mean being indecisive or morally mushy. You can have a take, just let it be informed. Let it evolve. Choose discernment over distance. And most importantly, don’t outsource your thinking to the algorithm. Nuance asks more of us, but it gives more back.

Most of us will naturally fall into habits of black-and-white thinking. You might recall the concept of denouement from high school Lit class. It translates from French to “the act of untying,” and this is the part of the plot where things tend to come together and into focus. It’s a satisfying model but not a universal one. Sometimes, things just end with unanswered questions and unresolved drama. And that’s just how it is.

Yes, nuance is inconvenient, and it requires more mental capital. But it gives us something more important than certainty: perspective. And that might be the rarest commodity we have left.

Daily Rip Live: Circle, Chime IPOs Open Floodgates for Fintech and Why ORCL is Well-Positioned in the AI Era

Watch us every weekday morning (M-Th) at 9 AM ET on X, YouTube, or in the Stocktwits app!

Every weekday, my co-host Shay Boloor and I cover the biggest market news and events LIVE on Stocktwits’ morning show, The Daily Rip Live.

Here’s what we covered on Thursday’s show:

⇢ 3:00 People making a big deal about their birthdays: red or green flag? I say GREEN! HBD to my co-host, Shay Boloor!

⇢ 4:57 Oracle posts earnings beat and shares shoot up 8% on cloud revenue. $ORCL ( â–Ľ 1.91% )  

⇢ 11:26 Oracle is functioning as a 'nerve center' for enterprise AI, and there's also SAP! $SAP ( â–˛ 0.85% )  

⇢ 23:00 Neobank Chime IPOs! Will this set off fintech IPO season? Also, do you really need to choose between SoFi and Robinhood as an investor? $CHYM ( â–˛ 5.81% )  $SOFI ( â–˛ 5.75% )  $HOOD ( â–˛ 5.72% )  

⇢ 32:50 Are we desensitized to tariff drama? Our guest Daniel Newman challenges me that the markets are shaking tariff news off, and new data from Axios backs his claim up.

⇢ 36:09 Behind the cybersecurity thematic: how businesses need to evolve to thwart attacks from the outside and inside. We also talked about the nuclear energy implications for cybersecurity names like Crowdstrike and Palo Alto Networks. $CRWD ( â–Ľ 0.26% )  $PANW ( â–˛ 0.94% )  

⇢ 45:56 Revisiting Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang's bullish remarks on quantum computing and its near-term commercial applications. $NVDA ( â–˛ 1.92% )  

See you bright and early on Monday for another episode!

Now Here’s a Chart

Middle East tensions have spiked crude oil prices by 7-10%, hitting around $74-$76 per barrel. A potential blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, a key oil shipping route, could choke off 20-30% of global supply, pushing prices even higher.

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Tuesday Thursday Saturday is written by Katie Perry, owner of Ursa Major Media, which provides fractional marketing services and strategy in software, tech, consumer products, professional services, and other industries. She is also the co-host of Stocktwits’ Daily Rip Live show.

Disclaimer: The contents here reflect recaps and summaries of pre-reported or published data, news, and trends. I have cited sources and context for the information provided to the best of my ability. The purpose of the newsletter is to inform and educate on larger trends shaping business and culture — this is NOT investment advice. As an investor, you should always do your own research before making any decisions about your money or your portfolio.