Nagarjuna, the 2nd-century Buddhist logician, demonstrated that every analytical tool contains a hidden assumption about the kind of thing it can analyze — and that this assumption is almost never examined. His method, prasanga — reductio ad absurdum applied recursively to the tool itself, not just its outputs — revealed that frameworks don't just fail to capture reality; they actively constitute what their user is capable of seeing as a problem worth solving. For investors and decision-makers, this cuts at something most secondary thinking models miss: they're designed to check your primary thesis, but they inherit the same ontological category — the same basic definition of what 'a problem' looks like — as the primary model itself. A discounted cash flow check on a DCF-derived thesis isn't a second opinion; it's the same opinion formatted differently. The sharpest secondary model you can run isn't another analytical layer — it's a deliberate attempt to reframe what category of event you're watching. Is this a valuation problem, a narrative problem, a liquidity problem, or a coordination problem? Those four framings demand different secondary models, and the choice of framing is prior to all of them. Make that choice explicitly, out loud, before reaching for your toolkit.

What is the opposite of the category you've used to frame your most active current position — and what would a secondary model built on that opposite category tell you?

Drawing from Madhyamaka Buddhist Philosophy / Nagarjunian Dialectics — Nagarjuna (Mūlamadhyamakakārikā / Fundamental Verses on the Middle Way, c. 2nd century CE)