Having a base knowledge of music definitely helps understand what to do with it. However, I like the self taught approach because it allows me to play the instrument in the way that it speaks to me. I feel like sometimes, people learn themselves into a box with their instruments, and they're never aware that they could go outside of that box. That's what I'm afraid of. That being said, at this rate whenever I pick up a new instrument I can carry over things like rhythm, whether to go up or down, and melody (to a certain degree, since of how much intervals can differentiate from instrument to instrument), and that base knowledge came from my dad when I first picked up the guitar.
Another thing to consider is what you're playing. If you're an (pauses to say as unpretentiously as possible) avant-garde improvisation multi-instrumentalist (****) like myself, my approach definitely works wonders for what you can do on your instrument. But if you want to play classical music on the piano, lessons would be the route to go. In the long run, it doesn't really matter as long as you make some interesting music.
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Studies show that when a given norm is changed in the face of the unchanging, the remaining contradictions will parallel the truth.
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