[auggierose]

Working very hard is not well-defined in this context. What does it even mean? You can work hard when you have a clear goal, let's say put those 10 barrels onto that truck over there. Or, let's write a new web browser within 2 years. Putting out 20 papers per year can also be considered working very hard.

You don't want people who work very hard. You want people who will EVENTUALLY put out new, original, and truly interesting research. HOW they do this is not up to you.

And there is a difference between truly interesting research, and just busy work research. It's not that easy to identify truly interesting research without the benefit of hindsight. It is somewhat easier to identify busy work research for an objective subject matter expert (but of course this is not 100% either, and personal preferences can definitely cloud the experts judgement).

[guhidalg]

You need people who got excellent grades in their undergrad program, who have somehow demonstrated that they like the field they’re going into academia for (as in clubs, extracurriculars, and whatnot), and who peers recommend as being likely to do novel research. The last one requires, gasp, talking to the applicant and seeing if they’re full of shit.

[auggierose]

That's already done now. People in Academia have excellent grades, and they like what they do. How would peers know about their ability to do novel research, not having done any themselves?