Strictly speaking, I don't think that's true if you're the smartest person in the world. John von Neumann springs to mind, who did his mathematics PhD at the s

Strictly speaking, I don't think that's true if you're the smartest person in the world. John von Neumann springs to mind, who did his mathematics PhD at the same time as his chemical engineering degree, with a friend of his commenting that Evidently a Ph.D. thesis and examination did not constitute an appreciable effort. [0] To my knowledge he never really failed at any of his intellectual pursuits, but I could be mistaken. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_von_Neumann#University_studies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_von_Neumann#University_st...