Nuance
Written by Tamás Deme on Thu Dec 12 2024. Updated on Thu Dec 12 2024.
So I ended my last post saying "we need more nuance" and I thought it might be worth it to clarify what exactly I meant by that.
What it isn't #
When I say we need more nuance, I’m not talking about fundamental human rights. I’m not advocating for debating the basics of whether certain groups deserve to exist or to live with dignity. We can’t tolerate ideologies that undermine the foundation of equality and respect. Observing societal discussions, it looks like the paradox of intolerance has it right.
The paradox of tolerance is a philosophical concept suggesting that if a society extends tolerance to those who are intolerant, it risks enabling the eventual dominance of intolerance, thereby undermining the very principle of tolerance.
And my call for nuance doesn’t extend to these conversations.
What it is #
Where we need more nuance is in our discussions about solutions. The problems we face in the world are incredibly complex and multifaceted. People are often quick to decry specific groups, events, or singular causes as the main drivers behind the events in the world they don’t like, but the truth is almost always more complicated. There’s rarely just one thing to blame or one lever to pull that will magically fix everything.
It reminds me of DNA editing. Sometimes we think "If we can just toggle this one gene, we’ll cure this disease." But things are never that simple. Changing one thing in the genome often affects three other things, leading to unexpected consequences. Society, economy, technology... all of these systems are just as interconnected. Every decision, every solution we try, touches not just one problem but ripples outward in ways we may not immediately see. Not to mention the recent demonizing of intellectualism, which does not help give credibility to the experts that foresee the consequences of our actions.
This is why anyone promising quick and easy fixes is almost certainly oversimplifying. Real solutions require us to look at the whole picture, to understand the root causes and any effects our solutions may have. None of those solutions will be simple or solve everything. They demand patience, humility, and the willingness to embrace complexity. If you're stuck somewhere bad and you have an option to stay where you are or get on a bus that moves you in the direction of where you want to go, even if it doesn't take you exactly where you are headed you should get on the bus. Mostly, because the high-speed railway from bad-place-nowhere-ville to utopia-where-everything-is-solved-land does not, and is not going to exist.
shore party out