"Aren't all the stock markets in the world essentially based on assumptions and hearsay? Oops sorry for that generalization. But then isn't your, "Case by case my friend," a kind of generalization too? Anyway, where money is involved, I just don't see how you can avoid generalizing to some extent. For example, we're all generalizing that McFaulds Lake is going to be very big. But do we as private investors know this for a fact?"

The stock market is based on cause and effect, with the players being part of the cause and you being part of the effect, particularly when you leave things to assumptions and hearsay.  You better be relying on more than that. 

How can "case by case" be construed as generalizing.  You've lost me there. 

We may generally agree that McFaulds is going to be "big", but as individuals I hope we did not come to that consensus by generalizing or we could be in for big trouble.  This consensus that came about was from the D.D. of individuals digging very deeply into factual information regarding geological data, administrative bios, market analysis, and a lot of years of experience on the part the posters with the result being that many came to the same conclusions.  Assumptions and hearsay is the latter part of the equation but you better know the former in order for the latter to have any credence.