While IQ is a blunt instrument, saying giftedness doesn't matter is like saying money doesn't matter. It doesn't, but it does. Compare the purchasing power and

While IQ is a blunt instrument, saying giftedness doesn't matter is like saying money doesn't matter. It doesn't, but it does. Compare the purchasing power and variety of options for solving problems of a millionaire to someone who earns low hundreds of thousands a year. Compare those to that of a billionaire. Then compare how someone who inherited the money to someone who saved it, and again to someone who got it as part of an exit. Intelligence is analogous to money this way in that you can acquire it from inheritance and upbringing, slog through work/academia and study, or get it as the result of drive and experience/risk. Someone who had money who becomes poor is a different kind of poor, and someone who is poor who becomes wealthy is a different kind of rich. Giftedness is a kind of class that has its own pitfalls and outcomes. When you have money, like intelligence, it's not something you think about much, even if it is weirdly revered by a lot of other people. A lot of people think they could solve a lot of their problems if they were only richer or more intelligent, but when you are rich or intelligent, you realize quickly that these are not so much solutions as they are excuses that keep their circumstances bearable.