attacks on "The Bell Curve"
Topics: AA
29 Oct 1994
From: "DG Ervan Darnell"
I have not read "The Bell Curve". I don't know exactly what it says nor do
I disagree with what its critics have said. However, the hysteria of the
response produces some good theatre. It seems like everyone is fighting to
get in line to prove their PC credentials by being the first to slam it
(and, again, perhaps it deserves that). The criticisms are amazingly weak.
The most common one seems to be 'look at this long laundry list of great
blacks'. Yes, but "bell curve" is the word here, ccuurrvveee. Of course
there is variation, carefully choosing the endpoints as your data set is
useless (as Susan Faludi did in "Backlash" to prove sexism is getting
worse). Even the liberal parody of the conclusion is only that the average
black is less intelligent, not every single one.
My favorite is various journalists assuring us that this is bad science.
Journalists, the people still telling us the shuttle is in orbit beyond
earth's gravity, are now experts on what constitutes good science? I don't
think so.
Cynthia Tucker, on tonight's MacNeil/Lehrer, criticized it for being an old
notion, and therefore wrong. Duh, well, so is the Copernican theory, and?
Or, perhaps closer to home is the liberal argument that libertarians are
trying to roll back the clock to discredited 17th century notions of
Laissez-Faire, as if changing opinion forever invalidates a once accepted
idea (though, as truly scientific research goes, there is some truth to
thesis, but that's not the realm we are in).
Erwin Knoll opined that looking at the white elite debating in congress
should be sufficient proof that whites are not very intelligent. Well, it
was humorous.
'This sort of reasoning was used to justify slavery'. Yes, and used
incorrectly so.
'We have modern gene sequencing data that shows there is very little
difference between all of us.' There is also very little difference between
humans and chimpanzees. For that matter, there are lots of multi-megabyte
OS's that can be made a lot dumber by twiddling just one bit.
'This country was founded on the notion that all men are created equal.'
This is a curious one, worthy of a little analysis. The implicit assumption
is that by merely legally defining things to be equal they will be
regardless of reality. That's a theme liberals like to repeat in many
arenas. Also interesting is that liberals have completely forgotten what
was meant by this phrase. It didn't mean the government should use force to
make sure everyone is equally poor or stupid or whatever. It meant (and
still means) that people have natural rights, rights to speach, and
property, and person. No one is born under a special obligation to do as
others command.
Which brings us back to a real point. In the big picture, it doesn't matter
if Murray's thesis (or the parody thereof) is right or wrong. People have
no fewer rights for being dumber rather than smarter, regardless of whether
the cause is environmental or genetic, and regardless of whatever
discernable causes exist in determining these factors.
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