I'm surprised with he haven't got the usual HN comments which appear every year when this story is posted. That's a good thing, but here's my "inb4" reply for when those comments finally pop up.<p>Type 1. Last year there was a comment like "I don’t want to crush dreams. But these kids are being set up to fail. They cannot, and will not, live up to these expectations." Related to this are the complaints that these kids only achieved the things they've achieved prior to the programme because their parents were well-connected and helped them out, etc.<p>Type 2. Accusing hypocrisy on behalf of Thiel, who has two advanced degrees, and who often advocates for a return to advanced research which couldn't happen without higher education.<p>I think type 1 comments come from envy, even if they sound like something else. That's understandable, since many HN readers probably have similar smarts to these kids but didn't get the same opportunities in their teens. I know I felt jealous when I first heard of the Thiel program.<p>But - if you look at history, geniuses seem clustered around particular times and locations - ancient Athens, Renaissance Venice, Victorian London, and a few other cultural hubs. This implies that there were thousands of <i>potential</i> geniuses who died in rice paddies (or were killed in war, or who happened to be members of oppressed minorities, or who lived in an era when all the smartest people worked in investment banking, or whatever). It's not just that these individuals were robbed of their potential, it's also the world that was robbed of their contributions. So any attempt to mitigate that trend can only be a good thing, even if it means that some future Einsteins are still dying in rice paddies.<p>Part 2 is a more interesting critique. My response: I can't speak for Peter Thiel, but I don't think he believes that university shouldn't be an option. Rather, university shouldn't be the <i>only</i> option.