In Defence of Non-Experts

Establishing who should have their voice elevated is less straightforward than Murray and his defenders believe.

Written by Noah Carl.

The debate between Dave Smith and Douglas Murray on Joe Rogan’s podcast has reignited a conversation on the right about the value of experts and expertise.

For those who didn’t catch the debate, here’s a brief summary. Its purpose was to ventilate the arguments for and against the West’s policy in Ukraine and Israel’s war in Gaza, with Murray representing those “for” and Smith those “against”. Right off the bat, Murray asked Rogan, “Do you think you’ve had enough people on who are supportive of either war?” (the implication being that he hadn’t). This prompted a lengthy discussion about whether Rogan had platformed too many people with non-mainstream or fringe views, and whether it’s even appropriate for non-experts (including Smith) to pontificate on subjects like geopolitics on one of the world’s most popular podcasts.