Definition of expert: Has brief case and is more than 20 miles from home.

In reality, you may be smarter than the "expert" if you have been studying the data and viewing/listening to the range of opinions out there on the topic. The person who is not inquisitive, so allocates his thinking to others (experts), can not conceive that you being non-credentialed could possibly know anything. Yet, in every field we see the major breakthroughs in knowledge are most often made by amateurs, who have an uphill battle against the credentialed experts defending their turf.