I would say your criticism is akin to the curse of knowledge [1], wherein you know all of the relevant background information and so you have difficulty putting

I would say your criticism is akin to the curse of knowledge [1], wherein you know all of the relevant background information and so you have difficulty putting yourself in the position of someone who does not. The author is writing the article for someone who could very well be learning this for the first time and may think to themselves "Hmm... this is something unusual and counterintuitive.". Since you are not that reader the author's writing could come across as annoying, but it's not wrong or misleading, it's a way for the author to hint to the reader that they are empathizing with them and will address this unintuitive notion further (which the author does). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curse_of_knowledge https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curse_of_knowledge