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I'd say these experts are covering their behinds in case someone comes up sick or dead from misadventure, it's the old “Don't try this at home kiddies!” caveat. If you are careful in your identification, and you know what environment to expect to find a particular edible plant, you vastly improve your chances of safe foraging.

As for keeping you alive, exclusively foraging is under the best of circumstances a caloric "break even" proposition, hunter-gatherers were hunters first, because plant nutrition foraged in the wild is a very energy intensive operation usually burning more than it provides in calories to gather the foodstuffs. If you are considering a situation where you might find yourself completely depending on food you can gather by hand, you really have to learn how to hunt, trap and snare both game and fish to supplement your foraging and not be squeamish about where your protein and fats come from.

In the case of fungi ... one has to be very certain or dead. Not much wiggle room. We spent the whole morning hiking and identifying...and the second part of the day we were to gather 'shrooms based on what we learned, and bring them back to camp. Our assembled gathering was spread out and the instructors explained what was good/edible, and what wasn't. They heated up a small stove and cooked up the edibles.....several harvested varieties were discarded...a few where discussed....and the two *doctors* couldn't agree on a few...and those were discarded with the caveat.

What I learned from this exchange was....if they can't be *sure* or agree...what chance do I have? Yikes!

Well, today's paper had a story about a fam that got sick from eating mushrooms last week that were poisonous. :(

http://www.courant.com/health/connecticut/hc-mushroom-sick-20121016,0,4131181.story