From the article:
Those of us who managed sky-high SAT scores at 13 were 20 times as likely as the average American to get a doctorate; let's say, being charitable, that we're 100 times as likely to make a significant scientific advance. Since we're only 1 in 10,000 of the U.S. population, that still leaves 99% of scientific advances to be made by all those other kids who didn't get an early ticket to the genius club. We geniuses aren't going to solve all the riddles. Most child prodigies are highly successful—but most highly successful people weren't child prodigies.
Suppose a Study of Exceptional Talent qualifier who goes to graduate school is twice as likely to have a very successful academic career (getting tenure at a research university) than someone with a similar undergraduate GPA but who was not in SET. Depending on the interests and values of the non-SET person, it may well be rational to "quit" -- to not aim for a PhD but to look for work or go to professional school (law, business, medicine) instead. It is so difficult to get the academic jobs that PhDs want that I would encourage only the true superstars to go to graduate school. That is the advice I will give my children.
