Thanks very much for that reply! And I think you're right about that. There are very few non-LAC schools where the undergrads actually expect to be grad students in the future. So that's probably enough to make Chicago unique. Whereas at a place like Stanford, they might disdain the grad students since there is so much social pressure to join startups rather than grad school.
So I'm applying for grad schools right now, and am visiting Yale, Brown, and UChicago this month (I already got accepted into UChicago, and also got invited to expenses-paid visits to both Yale and Brown). I'm visiting Yale in just 2 days.
So what are some cool things a LWer can do at those places? And which professors do research that a LWer could potentially find very interesting? Which universities would a LWer find himself/herself most at home at?
Also, is there anything else I need to know about those places?
I'm still waiting for decisions from Columbia and MIT (and got rejected by Caltech).