There seems to be a false dichotomy here, where you either 1. go to school or 2. start a business fresh out of high school. At this age, a person’s frontal cort

There seems to be a false dichotomy here, where you either 1. go to school or 2. start a business fresh out of high school. At this age, a person’s frontal cortex has not even finished developing, and yet we culturally treat the moment as a final decision point that determines the outcome of the rest of one’s life. Thiel seems to sell this as option 2.; the final defense against “woke” is to abandon the institutions entirely and forge your own determined path like a little 18 year-old John Galt. But depending on how one uses the resources, it may actually provide a third option: to fuck around and experiment for a little while with low risk of life-ruining failure, while you figure out what it is you actually want to do with your life. This is a privilege afforded to many in non-US countries where gap years are the norm, or where family wealth and connections can accommodate it.