Don’t discount domain experts. Models are meant to predict the real world. In order for them to be accurate, the model itself needs to capture how the real world works, and the math underlying the model has to be correct. Domain experts are the most likely to have experience in both areas. Drawing an example, a physicist models the universe and knows the math and model behind electromagnetism. A mathematician probably knows the math but maybe not the model.
I'm at the point where it shouldn't matter who did it, what should matter is its integrity. I'd prefer everything was anonymously posted at some level so author background didn't go into consideration regarding how it was received.
I agree with you completely, but the flip side of the coin is that experts can be blinded by assumptions that the field has. Sometimes outsiders aren't aware of these basic assumptions and so are less biased.
There's also the simple issue that sometimes expertise comes from places you least expect for reasons you might not anticipate.
For me there's as many problems in this pandemic related to appeals to authority (at least in the US) -- problems with testing related to FDA regulation and the CDC, problems with lack of healthcare providers due to long-term rent-seeking monopolies in licensing and practice scope, problems related to academic fraudulence and incentives (see: Didier Raoult) -- that I think it's dangerous to raise appeal to authority as anything but a bias.
For me there's multiple levels of problems to this, the first of which is the conspiracy and anti-science culture surrounding the pandemic. Above that is an appeal to medical and scientific expertise and authority that has sometimes been helpful but sometimes harmful. Above that still is an appeal to rigorous thinking and risk management, which transcends expertise boundaries.
