The Bell Curve: Not Hopeless

IN 1971 Richard Herrnstein, co-author with Charles Murray of this weighty volume, published an article in The Atlantic Monthly arguing that success—status, income, power—now depends on intelligence. We are becoming a “meritocracy” with great hereditary inequalities. The Bell Curve lucidly organizes an immense amount of data demonstrating empirically that, despite costly efforts to stave it off, meritocracy is becoming a reality. Before continuing, let me dispose of two distractions which have produced hysterical and silly columns—e.g., in The New Republic (unexpected) and the New York Times (expected); although, to be fair, elsewhere the Times was rational.

1. The Bell Curve shows that cognitive ability measured by IQ tests reliably predicts success—professional, academic, pecuniary—and that, on average, African-Americans have an IQ about 15 points below that of Caucasians, whose IQ, in turn, is lower (by about 5 points) than that of East Asians. Success differs accordingly. However, the point would be the same if all low-and high-IQ persons were Caucasians. Ethnic differences in IQ cause political complications but do not otherwise affect the hereditary social stratification described and predicted by The Bell Curve. (Incidentally, why should anyone expect all ethnic groups to have the same average IQ? Why not the same skin color?)

EH

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Ernest van den Haag

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IN 1971 Richard Herrnstein, co-author with Charles Murray of this weighty volume, published an article in The Atlantic Monthly arguing that success—status, income, power—now depends on intelligence. We are becoming a “meritocracy” with great hereditary inequalities. The Bell Curve lucidly organizes an immense amount of data demonstrating empirically that, despite costly efforts to stave it off, meritocracy is becoming a reality. Before continuing, let me dispose of two distractions which have produced hysterical and silly columns—e.g., in The New Republic (unexpected) and the New York Times (expected); although, to be fair, elsewhere the Times was rational.

1. The Bell Curve shows that cognitive ability measured by IQ tests reliably predicts success—professional, academic, pecuniary—and that, on average, African-Americans have an IQ about 15 points below that of Caucasians, whose IQ, in turn, is lower (by about 5 points) than that of East Asians. Success differs accordingly. However, the point would be the same if all low-and high-IQ persons were Caucasians. Ethnic differences in IQ cause political complications but do not otherwise affect the hereditary social stratification described and predicted by The Bell Curve. (Incidentally, why should anyone expect all ethnic groups to have the same average IQ? Why not the same skin color?)