LW has a problem. Openly or covertly, many posts here promote the idea that a rational person ought to be able to self-improve on their own. Some of it comes from Eliezer's refusal to attend college (and Luke dropping out of his bachelors, etc). Some of it comes from our concept of rationality, that all agents can be approximated as perfect utility maximizers with a bunch of nonessential bugs. Some of it is due to our psychological makeup and introversion. Some of it comes from trying to tackle hard problems that aren't well understood anywhere else. And some of it is just the plain old meme of heroism and forging your own way.
It would appear that people disagree with you. I would caveat that lone wolf can be useful for some problems but useless for others. Don't go reinventing the wheel instead learn from other people's experiences.
Will write a post on it.
If you try lone wolf and succeed, more power to you. My post is aimed at those who repeatedly try and fail. There are many such people. LW has been mostly telling them to try harder, hack themselves, etc. That advice is harmful. I think it's important to make a clean break from advice that's harmful to many people.
In contrast, advising people to take classes is much less harmful. It doesn't push them into a cycle of guilt and self-abuse for the rest of their lives, as lone wolf advice does. They just take the class, learn the stuff (most people who take classes do end up learning stuff), and move on.