[yummyfajitas]

My view is more that most people have a distaste for learning, education and autodidacticism because they grow up steeped in a culture that discourages these things, while simultaneously rewarding the opposite sorts of behaviors.

Caplan has a counterargument to this - twin studies and various observational studies that attempt to do similar things. He goes into detail occasionally on his blog, and also in his book:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0465028616/ref=as_li_tl?ie=...

(The focus of the book is not on education, but on how variation in parenting strategy does not affect adult outcomes. )

Also, your view is not incompatible with Caplan's "elitist, Ayn Rand-ian worldview". Caplan merely asserts that at the time of entering college, it's pointless for most people. The specific reason at which it became pointless for them is irrelevant - "socioeconomic factors", genetics or whatever, it's still a waste of money.

[Scienz]

Interesting, and I'm glad to hear any counterarguments (no idea who downvoted you). I'll have to read the book and/or studies before I could give a good reply, but judging from the Amazon reviews, it looks like even he mitigates it in the book by saying some parental actions can have important effects (for an extreme example, being violently abusive to your kids). Given stuff like that, and a lot of the recent stuff in social influence on epigenetics[1], I'm a bit skeptical where to draw the line between nature and nurture. But I'll really have to read the book and twin studies before I could debate those points.

[1] http://www.psmag.com/navigation/health-and-behavior/the-soci...