Seconded. It seems to be a rather unfortunate video game meme in itself that MMOs (WoW particularly since it somewhat defines the genre currently) Massively reward time spent over skill. No amount of grinding low level content will make you capable of taking down say the Lich King in heroic mode (both skill- and gearwise) and to claim otherwise just shows that the extent of the knowledge of the person making the claim is limited to a single South Park episode. The most "celebrated" players are exactly the people who master the most difficult content first without the benefit of shared tactics (and usually with the highest gear handicap), not the the first guy who kills a billion sewer rats (even if there were such an Achievement).
It has been said by WoW developers responsible for generating new high-difficulty content that most of the challenge come from the fact that the best players are much, MUCH better than the average player (even more so that actual player community is aware of) that making content which is not trivial to the top guilds but is also beatable for the average joe has become somewhat impossible without certain gimmicks. Certainly, you can become say the richest player on your server just by investing massive amounts of time (though actually manipulating the Auction House seems nowadays a better strategy than grinding), but that just means that you'll be known as the guy who spent the most time gaming the AH (we actually have just such a player on our realm). If anyone think that's the game rewarding you for time spent instead of skill, I seriously suggest they spent a little more time researching the subject before pontificating on it.
Finally I apologize for the slightly combative tone of my first post, but I hope it's an excusable reaction, especially on this site, to a nearly "accepted wisdom" that doesn't really even survive the slightest scrutiny.
Just beat me to it.
I thought evo biology pretty obvious, actually. Maybe OP has some reason for disqualifying it?