> In the essay, he’s basically trying to square a circle: to reconcile the ideas that 1. natural talent exists and 2. everyone is morally equivalent. I don't t

> In the essay, he’s basically trying to square a circle: to reconcile the ideas that 1. natural talent exists and 2. everyone is morally equivalent. I don't think this ideas are incompatible, or even unintuitive: most people intuit that it's equally wrong to murder a gas station attendant and a professor of medical ethics, even if the latter is more prestigious and/or talented in some sense than the latter. (This is a recurrent theme in Scott Alexander's writing: establish a dichotomy and run with it, even if it's facially incorrect.)