If It's In Print, It Must Be True

"On p. 143 Weinberger writes "Deciding what to believe is now our burden" as opposed to being "passive knowers" who trust what we read in authoritative resources such as the Encyclopedia Britannica."

Isn't Weinberger simply repeating the old adage "If it's in print, it must be true?" (a sarcastic way of saying, just because it's in print doesn't mean it's true.) I just finished editing a book that was, I'm sorry to say, pure crap. Absolutely made no sense at all, and this is a non-fiction work by a woman with a doctorate, who is a native English speaker. Frankly, I nearly quit the course after the first 47-page chapter, because a. she made no sense linguistically; b. she made so many basic mistakes (missing citations, using words incorrectly, etc.); and c. the middle chapters were all about foul words - and she herself even used swear words to describe some things, which I find extremely unprofessional. I could not figure out how she managed to get a publisher to take this book on, until I found out that it was actually a vanity publishing job. Then it all made sense. For money, you can have anything you want to say put into print. Even if you have nothing to say, and say it quite badly.

So you see, the human filters - the experts - that Weinberger talks about, were always an illusion. Just because the Encyclopedia Britannica says it is so, doesn't necessarily mean it is so. Pluto is a good example. (The former planet, not the Disney character.)  Knowledge changes as we, as a global society, find out more.  I think the key is to keep an open mind and be flexible; I think that we were always responsible for what we chose to believe.