But this just leads back to my original point - the motives or authority of the speaker for an idea should have little weight into whether or not it's valid or

But this just leads back to my original point - the motives or authority of the speaker for an idea should have little weight into whether or not it's valid or sound. If there is bad information or a biased approach, that would be easy to root out when focused on the facts and logic in a vacuum. Editorializing or investigation into possible motives and the like puts the discussion on something that is not as important.