It is more useful to determine whether a source you’re looking at is not telling the truth. Find one black swan, you don’t have to look at all possible swans to determine the claim “all swans are white” is not correct.
In the example you gave, identify ways to determine whether the source is not telling the truth. That could include inaccurate quotes, or accurate quotes of faulty data, or consulting the cited texts plus competing texts, but I’m not sure it can include avoiding reading the cited texts even if you think it’s a waste of time.
It is more useful to determine whether a source you’re looking at is not telling the truth. Find one black swan, you don’t have to look at all possible swans to determine the claim “all swans are white” is not correct.
In the example you gave, identify ways to determine whether the source is not telling the truth. That could include inaccurate quotes, or accurate quotes of faulty data, or consulting the cited texts plus competing texts, but I’m not sure it can include avoiding reading the cited texts even if you think it’s a waste of time.
That makes a lot of sense. Looks like I’ll be slogging through a lot of links then. Thank you for the tip!