Except for veteran officers and military historians, almost nobody has any experience that is even remotely relevant to predicting the outcome of a war. But nearly everyone needs, in everyday life, to figure out if they're talking to a moron or a genius, to a crook or a saint; granted, they may not be good at it, but it's something they have definitely tried, at least in school.

Which is, after all, half of the whole argument for representative instead of direct democracy (the other half being logistics).