Isn't it safer to ignore IQ?

A reader writes:

Your column today was characteristically lucid & persuasive. However, I don't think the dialogue on ethnic IQ is going to attain quite the level of candor you prefer and I will try to identify an explanation more persuasive than upper class rent-seeking. Such behavior undoubtedly occurs, but I think the self-interest animating restraint on this subject is usually more enlightened.

Consider the risk associated with underestimating the cognitive ability of African-Americans. Relatively poor performance on IQ test may be attributable to: (a) defects in the tests and/or, (b) environmental factors unrelated to natural (genetically-bounded) abilities. With respect to (a) a less sophisticated variant of the argument would be that IQ tests tell us nothing about g; a more sophisticated variant would be that IQ tests do not tell us enough about mental abilities -- a point suggested in several of your interesting articles on the subject.

We have a subset of the population that has been subjected to official discrimination and is overrepresented in the lower deciles of income. This same subpopulation is, interestingly, responsible for a startlingly robust outburst of sustained creativity in the 20th century -- one might argue that African-Americans are responsible for much of America's cultural brand value. Jared Taylor loves the blues. I love jazz. Terry Teachout tries to explain that jazz is white but I remain unconvinced.

I am also unconvinced by AR articles wishing away African-American cultural charisma on the theory that sheer gregariousness can confer on imbecility an infectious charm. To restate the thesis is to refute it. Should we be buying so much from our cognitive inferiors? This question would be less pointed if we were buying drilling rights but the paradox is that we are buying intellectual property -- music, movies, lifestyles. Perhaps this is simply a sign of our decadence. But you are not a puritan. I imagine it gives you pause on occasion.

Having argued, non-frivolously I hope, that the risk of cognitive mismeasurement is non-trivial we should ask how the risk should be best managed. Affirmitive action represents the equivalent of a rational hedging mechanism. It is not explained by class rent-seeking but rather by the consciousness of risk that the meritocracy is overlooking merit. Our surplus is such that we are better served by a moderate tax on apparent merit to preserve the option of identifying overlooked or untapped potential.

We can apply the same logic to dialogue. The mainstream may simply reflect a consensus that the Bell Curve crowd has not carried its necessarily heavy burden. Remember: we do not merely buy from African-Americans, we also sell to them. Indeed, we sell as we inform since newspapers are simply a vehicle for the conveyence of advertisements. If the media conveyed a message of racial cognitive inequality it would possibly comfort a few whites and fewer Asians, but it would clearly cause much more indignation cutting across race & class. And, from the standpoint of elites with their ravenous appetite for human capital, it may damage the morale of the subpopulations most at risk for underachievement.

In short, the chance that you, Steve Sailer, are on the wrong track offers more potential for wealth creation than the chance that you are correct. The best way to see this may be to analogize the cost of civil rights to an option premium. The premium is reasonable in relation to the potential return (fabulous untapped human capital) and the risk (we will overlook the function of time just now). If you are right Steve, we just save the premium. That would be -- disappointing to the elites at this point. They redouble the bet. Fund returns are negative at the moment but we await the convergence event.

This argument would be more plausible if the we didn't see the exact same behavior surrounding the ultra-simple, ultra-certain question of racial difference in crime rates. But, as I wrote yesterday on VDARE.com:

In recent weeks, I've written extensively about the racial IQ gap, a subject the press typically ignores—or disseminates disinformation about. Still, we shouldn't blame them too much: IQ is a moderately complex topic, one that many members of the press simply aren't smart enough or intellectually curious enough to master.

In contrast, censoring the news about crime rates can't be blamed on journalists' stupidity. Instead, it demonstrates an appalling degree of moral corruption in our media because virtually every adult in America knows there are racial differences in crime rates. Everybody talks about real estate, and the racial makeup of neighborhood is the largest single factor driving crime rates and thus differences in house prices and apartment rents within a metropolis.

So, it seems likely that a different explanation for the white elite's censorship is needed.

Moreover, there's nothing very complicated about the basic fact of the racial gap in IQ. It correlates with practically everything else. What gets complex is the question of what caused it. But as Thomas Sowell has pointed out, we don't have a clue how to change IQ among people have reached their teens, so the gap will remain in existence for many decades, at minimum.

Nor is there any evidence that lying and censorship improves the morals of blacks. They can see that they are doing worse in school, making less money, and getting locked up more than whites. If it's widely considered racist to mention these things, then why wouldn't blacks feel it's racist for these things to be happening to them? When liberalism became dominant in the 1960s, the black crime rate and illegitimacy rate shot upwards.

Finally, there's the opportunity cost of the stupid things we do under the You Can't Talk About That rule. For example, does pushing algebra down into elementary school actually help most blacks?

Did anybody know that 67% of blacks are ineligible to enlist in the military until I pointed it out last week? No, because You Can't Talk About That. Yet, many pundits assumed that joining the Army was available to all blacks. Perhaps we need some other kind of organization to inculcate discipline? Well, nobody ever wrote about it before me because nobody was allowed to talk about the underlying cause.

My published articles are archived at iSteve.com -- Steve Sailer