Discerning expertise is a fundamental human skill

Biological organisms are intrinsically purposive. Relevance and motivation are not assigned from an outside but emerge integrally as functions of bodily predispositions and situational cicrumstance. In the active process of staying alive, moment-by-moment relevance and motivation arise simultanously with body and environment in situational autopoiesis (self-generation). Organisms are not passive recipients of external triggers but active agents of continuous change (Walsh, 2018, Objectcy and Agency: Towards a Methodological Vitalism, Oxford University Press). Modern conceptions claiming context- and situation- independent (ultimate) principles have lost sight of organismal agency. When ainmals are seen as instinctually abiding to laws of nature, human choice often is attributed to the randomness of fancy, and the trained ability to follow higher principles. 

Choice, however, is not merely picking from pre-given options but is an activity that allows for original possibilities to emerge. Phenomenological approaches highlight that repetition of practice provides the sensitivity to notice novel details not apparent to the less experienced (Dreyfus & Dreyfus, The Ethical Implications of the Five-Stage Skill-Acquisition Model, 2004, Bulletin of Science). Divergent systems of understandings thus arise. In any given field experts are recognised by their ability to respond appropriately. Assessing trustworthyness of claimed expertise is a fundamental human skill. However, when first principles are presupposed, the mere existence of divergent understandings may promote destructive distrust. I will exemplify the ramifications of principle-based and trust-based community organisation by comparing Patthabi Jois' Ashtanga Yoga and Larry Schulz' Rocket Yoga in terms of authority structures and knowledge transmission/generation in hierarchical vs. polycentric networks.