What Murray's mistake has made clear is that not all social taboos are idiotic. There is probably a good reason one is chastised for telling the naughty joke before grandma leaves the room, and it is not insane that we regularly whisper in private remarks we would not make at a public microphone. Context is critical, and the context in which one whispers a thought to a friend is vastly dissimilar from the informational circumstances involved in a speech, university lecture hall, or televised senate hearing.
There is special context to the question: "Are the IQs of U.S. blacks lower than those of European whites?" Indeed, asking about anyone's IQ seems a rather bold venture. I cannot remember ever having been asked mine (I do not know it). Not on a job interview--despite its great predictive power--nor by my physician, nor by a date, nor elsewhere. If I were, I would not take the question quite seriously: The question is rude.
Is it less rude to aggregate by racial subgroup? Indeed, why not aggregate elsewise, comparing, for instance, the IQs of people who worry about racial IQs vs. those who do not care? Without doubt, there is risk that useful social debate will be poisoned by such talk, rather than opened. It would seem that some great payoff should lie in the answer, a provocative insight to compensate for the offense.
But what is the socially redeeming value at which Murray arrives? Conservative multiculturalism!
Having little patience for the concept of a group IQ, and seeing that its logic leads Charles to this philosophical Devil's Island, I am delighted to hear that In Pursuit has recently been released in paperback. I urge you all to read and devour this delicious paean to individualism, written by one of our most brilliant thinkers. Which, with the issuance of The Bell Curve, suggests that IQ predicts not so well after all.
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