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Annoyance comments on Are You a Solar Deity? - Less Wrong
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"In comparative linguistics, for example, it's usually possible to make a case that two languages are related good enough to convince a layman, no matter which two languages or how distant they may be."
The real question is why we think that experts in the field actually know more than laymen. If a shoddy argument has convinced the authorities, why don't we simply conclude that our argument standards are wrong?
The expert should at least know about few examples of incorrect theories based on superficial similarities between languages. (S)he should be also informed about the number of coincidences arising from pure chance when two totally unrelated languages are compared. And (s)he knows miscellaneous facts which provide additional checks. E.g. you wouldn't believe a claim that English is ten thousand years old if you know something about the rate of language evolution or the history of germanic and indo-european languages.
To suppose that the experts don't know more than laymen seems weird. It may be true for some pseudo-scientific disciplines where is nothing to be actually known, but that's not the case of linguistics. I would yet admit that the experts are probably not less biased than laymen since the knowledge of biases is not usually taught.