Thank you FabR! I agree, this ad is just pure incompetence and low standards. While there's no mens rea (criminal intent) it is definitely very incompetently done!
I too am very much a follower of #3. Always buy new from an AD. I've only bought used watches on one or two occasions from friends whom I know personally. Must trust the seller fully in order to make that determination.
I agree, hiring experts is no fun. But finding out you've been cheated is worse! I tell many of my newly minted tech millionaire friends to just forget the vintage Rolex game. Yet they persist into getting themselves into a deep area of the pool and have realized they were swimming in tar rather than swimming pool water. Two have come back to me stating they should've listened to me and got carried away in their newfound wealth. One has been in denial of my expertise, but it's quite clear under magnification that his dial is not original (the lume is completely crooked and a swiggly line). And another, is actually upset that I didn't explain in greater detail of every explicit scenario that could happen - I have no pity for him because he promised to have me check the piece before he made a decision and he didn't have me check the piece because he was rushed by the scammer.
I'm so glad that you give your students a reminder that they should always be look for evidence. If you look at many of the standardized tests before you even go into grad school, the GRE and GMAT tests are trying to weed out people who make assumptions. You don't score well if you make assumptions on those tests as they specifically put in answers that are very logical assumptions but that are incorrect.
I'd say those who make assumptions are often the ones who make many false claims and believe way too strongly in themselves. We had a WPS reader who insisted that Louis Vuitton spent 50% of revenue on marketing; he was simply wrong, but he believed highly of himself since he was very successful and he had learned to trust his instinct. It was that instinct that made him a successful individual living in the most expensive zip code in the USA, so he thought that he couldn't be far off from the truth. Another recent assumption is that AMAZON makes a huge amount of money off online retail with large profit margins (ever heard of AWS) and cannot be convinced otherwise. I've worked with colleagues who make wrong assumptions all the time, especially subordinates, sometimes friends, and sometimes even family members (who get very upset when I point out that their assumption is not incorrect gut feelings and not facts). I was trained at a young age by my parents and teachers to be trustful of others, but be able to identify biases and opinions from fact, I remember in elementary school we read newspaper articles that were objective and try to find biases. A little skepticism isn't a bad thing. Of course, now I'm setting up myself for a blockbuster movie, a con artist who takes down the person who writes articles on how to avoid watch scams. Uh oh, I don't want this target on my back! It's like the book Dangerous Liaisons where the chastic girl (Madame Tourvel) who promises to be abstinent until her wedding night gets pursued by the Vicomte de Valmont specifically because of her chastic image. I concede! I'm the biggest fool of us all! And I've been fooled so many times! I am not a virgin to being scammed and I'm not a prize for scammers!