What did you expect them to say? That they are unhappy. I take this kind of investigation with a pinch of salt. It can be a case of the ladies doth protest too much of their happiness. In my personal experience, many complain of loneliness as they grow older.
An (sadly? or rather realistically) that is what it boils down to, people who read the classics, read the classics, whether at Harvard or elsewhere. People who are critical thinkers, are critical thinkers, again whether at a college or elsewhere. People who X, X. To think that spending money (and increasing amounts of it) will change this is sheer insanity. Sure, you might get a few that otherwise would have never Xed to now X, but is it not just fundamentally inefficient? For every p that now Xs how many are still as lost? What would one do next?
Concerning the nurture component; Change their parents? Take the children away to be raised by a government?
I agree, the unwashed masses do destroy most of everything. Granted Harvard is not what it used to be, same as an MS is not what it used to be, a Phd is not what it used to be. In the past the quality was even higher, more akin to an artisan workshop than whatever mass-anything you could conceive of.
That's not hyper-capitalistic, that's just fascist/pseudo-feudalist. Throughtout history everyday people have been pretty much powerless in any meaningful way, always, no exception except maybe for early USA history.
Food is way worse quality wise. I even can't help but think that the average person had access to better quality food in the Soviet Union than in modern USA (granted, possibly not the same quantity, but still). Coming from a recent trip abroad, let's say the difference is striking.
I do not know where you got this idea but it seems to me on the right track. This theory actually is the one followers of Ray Peat tend to be partial of. Cholesterol (among other things) is just treated as a number to be lowered or whatever; how many people actually ponder whether it just is a protective mechanism for an underlying condition, deficiency or an adaptation to an inflammatory diet?
This btw, results in misguided solutions such as statins which (at least in my family, n=4) produce a reduced quality of life.
High cholesterol, low thyroid function. Simple, but the details and how this maps to lifestyle and diet changes it gets very tricky. That's why we have vegan and vegetarians with high cholesterol, (extremely hard to keep a healthy metabolism, let alone on a plant-based diet, most people confuse the temporary surge in stress hormones with an sustainably energetic metabolism.)
It is usually a case of "the lady doth protest too much". They project their own emotionality onto others while professing to follow logic and restraint. I'm not a trained psychologist by any means but is the modern cultural obsession with image a kind of widespread narcissism? I see these self-professions of rationalism as just another flavor of the same thing "look at me, I'm special, I'm very logical". Furthermore I speculate if the modern world with the gray dullness of equality, democracy, and mass culture drives people to find ways to differentiate from the rest. I'm interested on what's your take as I too have seen religious thought in the loudest atheists.
One interesting essay on the history of some philosophies and worldviews you might like is Eric Vogelin's Science, Politics and Gnosticism (1968). Here he traces a lot of modern thought back to the early Gnostic religion. The lack of self-reflection and particularly the righteousness I see today makes me think his point is very accurate.