> He never once wrote that only first-rate colleges produce these individuals, nor has anyone with any sense ever stood by rankings as anything more than a proxy for some deeper hierarchy. And yes, like it or not, the higher ranked schools attract and produce more ambitious and intelligent humans in the aggregate.
The specific claim was:
> > Many of the colleges that use this are third rate colleges that aren't going to have too many "creators, entrepreneurs and groundbreaking scientists".
which is much stronger than saying that more such people are attracted by higher-'rated' colleges; I have no problem with the idea that there are lots of such people at first-rate colleges, only with the idea that there aren't many at other colleges. I agree that the claim says nothing about causality or about 'production' of such students, but neither did I.