[eyelidlessness]

> A little preparation and basic work-study and critical thinking skills is all a post needs, along with something you really want to say and is actually worth saying, of course.

Unless you have high confidence in your ability to grasp the subject, this can be considerably daunting to someone who isn’t blessed with high confidence generally. And one can at least infer that gaining that confidence may involve significant time and effort. Especially in a forum where existing contributions are:

- high volume - scored by peers - fast moving - particularly accepting of critical feedback along some lines but biased against other kinds of critical feedback

This can be very discouraging. I know from my own experience that even as someone who has a tendency to challenge, I find myself constrained by my lack of experience on many subjects, my estimation of the time involved to become conversant, and my general feeling of limited time and energy. And... yeah, then I find myself more inclined to read others’ opinions, more confident than my own, and defer to trusting them unless I have a strong instinct otherwise.

That seems like a pretty normal reaction for someone with limited attention and study resources? Am I missing something?

[nske]

When low in confidence, you could just use phrases like "my understanding is that [...]", or "from what I gather [...], is that not the case?" If you stand corrected you stand corrected and you're wiser, likely together with some other readers, everyone wins!

People rarely bash others that express themselves modestly and sincerely.

[mrtranscendence]

On the other hand, I’ve been criticized for being too eager to hedge anything I say with something like “in my understanding, ... I could be wrong.”