Assuming they spoke and could read Latin, Hebrew, and Greek, the interpretation and learning of which was dependent upon some form of authority.
There’s no real issue with authority in and of itself. Being able to leave comments on a popular blog gives you no more real access to that authority than not being able to leave comments. In order to approach that, you pretty much need to invest the time and effort into your own study. That’s what is ultimately meant by the Asimov quote, not that folk should be excluded merely because they’re not authorities.
If you want to challenge authority, become one. But if it’s a difficult subject, becoming one will also be difficult.
Though some might feel that this is somehow “broken” or “needs reform”, this sort of rhetoric is also used to justify intellectual laziness (or even dishonesty) in a number of other ways.
Take evolution; advocates of Intelligent Design present themselves as honest critics of established scientific dogma, but they can’t help but reveal they either understand very little about the science they attempt to critique, or are not capable of the honesty real science demands. Yet they present themselves as legitimate authorities.
Or take climate change: denialists as a whole wield far more influence over the topic and dialogue than they’ve earned. Why should those who advocate for the unrestrained squandering of natural resources be regarded as authoritative?
Or take an example of the simply mistaken: an artist and very prolific blogger who has undue influence over how some extinct reptiles might be perceived to nonspecialists…he’s not an expert, but his knowledge of anatomy is fairly extensive, but the process by which he comes by his observations is so flawed that his conclusions are useless. Why should his results rank far higher in a popular search engine when I’m looking for information on a specific taxon?
The fact is, not everything in science is universally accessible. How can it be? Not everyone has a computer capable of doing large scale climate modeling. Not everyone has direct access to pterosaur fossils (which are obviously rare). Not everyone has access to knowledge without time, study, and effort.
But combined with authorship, those are the things that make authority.
