# Interesting podcast conversation between Sam Harris and Charles Murray (of "Bell Curve" fame) **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [April 23, 2017, 9:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052 "2017-04-23T09:21:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/181 "2017-04-24T21:13:30Z")
## _Missed the edit window. The following is something I wrote and then misplaced in the process of quoting and editing (which I dare not do within the board proper, as it has eaten long posts before):_ **Andy** , no comment at all on what I quoted from _Freakonomics_? > [@Richard\_Parker](#): > > This may be how you see yourself, but it doesn’t actually make any sense (like many self-conceptions). You have two competing explanations for test score outcomes, racism or genes. Neither of them blames educators. A decision to reject racism as the explanation actually has nothing to do with your desire to protect the work of hardworking, conscientious educators. > > The other thing worth saying here is that Murray’s key claims aren’t even scientific claims. The science recording outcome disparities is perfectly valid, as far as it goes. What everyone rejects isn’t that part, it’s the part where Murray denies that racism is a sufficient explanation and speculates about what genetics might one day find. The claim about the effect of racism isn’t grounded in any scientific evidence and the speculation is just that, not a claim but a question. Saying “neither of them blames educators” tells me that you are woefully ignorant of the “school reform” movement, which has held powerful sway in both parties in recent decades. Dubya’s “No Child Left Behind” and Obama’s “Race to the Top” both used carrots but also heavy sticks against schools that didn’t get their test scores up. And it amazes me that you don’t see your giant blind spot. You say a genetics explanation for the disparities (which, as you say, are not disputed as far as their existence) must be abandoned absent ironclad proof; but you don’t seem to have any standard of proof at all for the nebulous “racism” explanation. (How does this work for the affluent black kids who go to schools generally recognized as “good” and live in an upper-middle-class milieu, yet still lag behind their peers?) You take “the reason is racism” as axiomatic, yet expect proof for alternate explanations. It’s quite reminiscent of a Gish Gallop! ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/182 "2017-04-24T21:16:01Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > Yes, and I’ve repeatedly acknowledged that. It is my view that they should be seen as the default group of humans, where most of the variety in the genome lies, and groups like East Asians and Northern Europeans should be seen as the much less diverse, more homogenous subgroups whose individual characteristics include higher IQ. It’s not hard to imagine that a group intrepid enough to push that far away from home would be self-selected for intelligence, nor that they would face greater environmental pressures once they were far into the hinterlands. Why are you so insistent on making this claim when we know virtually nothing about the genes for high and low intelligence? And why are outcomes now so reflective of genetic truth, but outcomes in the past, when different groups were on top or bottom, are not? ---
**Author:** ![Salvor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Salvor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Salvor)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/183 "2017-04-24T21:18:38Z")
> [@orcenio](#): > > Alright I’ll bite, what do you think **is** racism? If theories of racial hierarchy of intelligence/etc isn’t racist, I’m truly curious on what qualifies. Let me just copy past some definitions: \*prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one’s own race is superior. \* I do not want to discriminate or antagonize anyone based on some group characteristics, or go around thinking different races are superior/inferior. On the prejudice size, I think that is a bigger problem. I believe group characteristics and observations bleed into our expectations of individuals, and that forms prejudices that are unfair. I know I have plenty of those. But the key is to watch out for these failings in your interactions, even if they are there in your mind. \*the belief that all members of each race possess characteristics or abilities specific to that race, especially so as to distinguish it as inferior or superior to another race or races. \* I do not believe that ALL members of a race possess characteristics that make them superior or inferior to another. I think that there are plenty of black people that are far smarter than most white people. But further than that, in terms of my attitude towards the intrinsic worth of a human being, I do NOT believe one is superior to another just because they are smarter. Problem. Capitalism does. Capitalism and a pure meritocracy in education and the job market cares about competency and results, and in many more cerebral fields (with MUCH higher pay) that rely on greater intelligence, higher iq offers much greater rewards. So our system of earnings definitely DOES have a sort of hierarchy of man built into it. But that is partly why I am a LIBERAL. I do not WANT all of society based on a pure meritocracy, because we do not control ALL the variables that go into our success in life, like aptitude. I also do not think it feasible to toss out capitalism because it has this built in preference and hierarchy for certain aptitudes in modern society. I think we need to find other ways to tackle differences between populations and individuals. ---
**Author:** ![Corry\_El](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecae2f/32.png) [@Corry\_El](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Corry_El)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/184 "2017-04-24T21:24:58Z")
> [@Salvor](#): > > Why is that? Is THAT because society is oppressing black people in modern times? I think a larger factor is that there are fewer black people that have the chops to cut it in fields like computer science. > > NO ONE likes that possibility, and so there are two main responses. Deny it’s a reality (most of the intellectual cowards on this board), or accept it and try to do something about it or compensate for such realities in other ways. Almost nobody likes that possibility, true. A few actual racists might like it, but then they are the ones representing the straw man where any difference in intelligence\* distribution supposedly justifies a racial caste system where the ‘top’ person in one race would give up rights compared to the ‘bottom’ person in another, which morality aside simply does not logically follow from _any_ (even meaningful) difference in ability distribution by race. And that straw man argument is used to accuse eg. Murray of wanting such a system, which IMO is an obvious smear of the man. There’s no shred of evidence that that’s his motivation or goal. And pointing out that his left leaning tendencies on some issues aren’t leftist enough does not in any way establish he believes in a racial caste system. I agree with a previous post, the main practical argument is whether society should pursue this question, whether any good can come of it. I agree it’s smokescreen to claim it’s been determined that there are no such meaningful differences: no it hasn’t. But besides ‘deny it could be true’ or ‘accept it and do something about it’ there’s also ‘accept it’s possible and realize you that if so you can’t do anything about it per se’. It has implications when it comes to public policies designed under the assumption that genetics explains zero percent of the difference in group outcomes. But the reaction tends to be to accuse opponents of saying genetics explains everything, after you finish falsely accusing them of proposing a racial caste society, Murray being a proponent of neither position. \*no it doesn’t have to be a single measure; by whatever measure. It would be a fantastic result if no genetically based group differences showed up _no matter how you measured it_ but few AFAIK are hardcore PC enough to claim that’s the case. ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/185 "2017-04-24T21:26:51Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > There were some people in that thread gullible enough to still give you credit for your original prediction. But I’m far from the only one who laughed at you. To sum up: > > In the OP you predicted Trump would win. > > Then in [post #246](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=19717540&postcount=246), a couple weeks before the election, you posted this: > > Then you posted nothing further in the thread until [post #250](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=19764689&postcount=250), after the election: > > Which, I will say again, is ludicrous and you should be embarrassed. As **Chief Pedant** noted in response to your whining that just because you reversed yourself in post 246, it doesn’t change what you wrote in the OP: > > And in searching for those posts, I see you have been at it again, and deservedly [got called out](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=19845847&postcount=24) for it: > > If this makes me the liar, I don’t want to be the truthteller! :rolleyes: Thaks for helping me out by showing that what you wrote was not true. If you think that trying to attack me by posting lies will help distract from the fact that you are a lying racist troll, feel free to continue your efforts. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/186 "2017-04-24T21:27:50Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > And why are outcomes now so reflective of genetic truth, but outcomes in the past, when different groups were on top or bottom, are not? It’s exactly the same pattern as in sports. Jews were overrepresented demographically in basketball. Now they aren’t. Hmm. Genetics must have changed! Black people couldn’t swim really well. Why aren’t they in the Olympics? They must be genetically denser! That must be it! Oh, wait, they swim just fine and there are black swimmers. Genetics must have changed! It will always be genetics! except when that falls apart and suddenly it’s not genetics! And if people don’t have to start with defining who exactly is which race, well, it’s it’s remarkably handy how it can be redefined on the fly. My goodness that’s _handy_. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/187 "2017-04-24T21:30:27Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > **Salvor** , awesome, awesome post (#170). Great point about genetic engineering, too, which will make this all moot once people get over their squickiness. As I said, if \*\*Salvor \*\*comes defending you I know where he is confirming to all to belong. BTW no one here has complained about using genes to increase intelligence if that is ever found. So his monumental tirade was also a monumental straw man. (Unfortunately, studies that have been ignored even here point to the likelihood that not a single gene or even a group of them is responsible, but the work in conjunction with many of them, so we are talking many years into the future regarding gene therapy if that is found) ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/188 "2017-04-24T21:34:38Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > **Andy** , no comment at all on what I quoted from _Freakonomics_? I’ll notice that you’re still skipping lots of my points, but sure, I’d be happy to. This is not an easy problem to solve, very obviously. It’s not an easy question to answer. I certainly don’t claim to have all the answers. But there are a million possible explanations for why, on average, black students may be less likely to succeed. I’ve offered a handful in this thread already – others could include differing expectations by teachers (which isn’t a slam on teachers – teachers are victims of racism in society as well, and all of us, including teachers, are likely to have unconscious biases that we aren’t fully aware of), lower self-worth and beliefs in the possibility of success (demonstrated by studies that show that black children are more likely to choose the white doll as the “good doll” over the black doll, or similar) which could be caused by seeing subtle signs of white supremacism all over society; and lesser trust in authorities and traditional institutions, including educational institutions. There are many, many other possibilities. That the non-biological category “black people” just so happens to align with some genetic grouping that includes a lower likelihood of genes for high intelligence is another possibility, but there’s no actual evidence in the form of what these genes are, and how prevalent they are in various populations – and the Scarr study (which I linked to earlier in this thread) directly refutes this hypothesis by showing that black children with higher levels of African ancestry score exactly the same, on average, as black children with lower levels of African ancestry. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/189 "2017-04-24T21:35:30Z")
Hardly anything significant is built by a single gene. So? ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/190 "2017-04-24T21:36:45Z")
No comment so far by the Murray supporters about the Flynn effect. Do black Americans in the present have superior genetics for intelligence than white Americans from, say, a century ago? Did white American genes for intelligence greatly increase in the last century? Or is there another explanation for why IQ scores, on average, have improved over time (and thus another possible explanation for why IQ scores can differ between populations that isn’t based on genetics)? ---
**Author:** ![mr.jp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/48db29/32.png) [@mr.jp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mr.jp)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/191 "2017-04-24T21:41:22Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > No comment so far by the Murray supporters about the Flynn effect. Do black Americans in the present have superior genetics for intelligence than white Americans from, say, a century ago? Did white American genes for intelligence greatly increase in the last century? Or is there another explanation for why IQ scores, on average, have improved over time (and thus another possible explanation for why IQ scores can differ between populations that isn’t based on genetics)? Nothing here is an argument against anything Murray has said in The Bell Curve. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/192 "2017-04-24T21:44:29Z")
> [@Salvor](#): > > I’m convinced these people are li… not arguing in good faith at this point. > > They start with the presumption that all populations and races have equal average intelligence and work backward. They are loathe to go back to some ancient racist model of the hierarchy of man and are too dimwitted and uninspired to argue against that conclusion if we accept that there are group differences in iq. Who has started with this? In what posts? Please be specific. I haven’t started with any such presumption. > [@](#): > > I often see articles railing against tech firms for not having enough minorities working for them, especially in engineering fields. This of course, does not include asians, the latter group are over represented but since they do well they do not count against the narrative. An HONEST person would look at the stats and conclude that the tech companies are NOT some white boys club with that many asians. But I digress, one consequence is that the reason we see less blacks and hispanics in such employment is that they have fewer black and hispanic applicants to pick from, and if you go to university graduation rates and degrees, you find there are far fewer black and latino minorities either taking or graduating in stem fields like computer science. > > Why is that? Is THAT because society is oppressing black people in modern times? I think a larger factor is that there are fewer black people that have the chops to cut it in fields like computer science. > > NO ONE likes that possibility, and so there are two main responses. Deny it’s a reality (most of the intellectual cowards on this board), or accept it and try to do something about it or compensate for such realities in other ways. The question is why, not that this is true. Why do fewer black people have computer science degrees? Why must this have a simple answer? Why must genes be part of the answer when we know so little about the genes for intelligence, much less how prevalent they are in different populations. > [@](#): > > I want a ubi, in part because I think modern society is increasingly rewarding people with greater aptitude in our capitalistic economy. So one of my near term solutions is not to try to make all groups equally likely to be physicists, it’s to redistribute to minimize the downsides of not winning the genetic lottery, regardless of race. As a consequence of this, since I think black people have a lower average iq, they will get a disproportionate benefit from this kind of intervention. Is that me saying fuck the blacks, it’s not societies fault so let people wallow in the gutter? > > IS it? > > The second thing I want is what is already happening in China. BGI is sequencing the genomes of people and cataloging their iq and aptitude to try to tease out what gene combinations lead to what. Long term, I want us to offer the ability to enhance the children of anyone who wishes to boost stats like health and intelligence. > > Once we can do that last, it won’t MATTER that after tens of thousands of years of human migration and isolated development and civilization there were some measurable differences in average intelligence between populations, we can just boost people up through gene alterations so that NO person or group is left behind that does not wish to be. > > How is that racist? This is a LIBERAL policy of trying to help people after accepting that there are group differences. Accepting the latter does NOT imply we turn into conservative assholes. > > Conversely, those righteous LIBERALS who deny the effects of intelligence on the fates of men, or that there are ANY meaningful group differences, are actively fucking over the very people they claim to be defending. Why? Because they misdiagnose the problem. Intel and google are not anti black, that is not the reason there are fewer black engineers, we need more blacks that go into computer science and can do well. And if a large part of the reason that is not happening is because of different gene averages that contribute to intelligence, then we need to work to fix that, not pretend it has no bearing on reality. > > It’s like trying to bleed out a founder vs tackling the germ theory of disease. I do not CARE if you do not know how to fix things with the latter model a couple hundred years ago, it’s the correct model, so you need to shift focus towards things that actually help and will ACTUALLY matter. > > God, sometimes I hate liberals. This thread is full of incalculable wishful thinking, we’re all the same! Children. Nature does not give a fuck that we are more equal, WE do as human beings, and WE have to be the ones to make that happen. Not just pretend nature is egalitarian like we are. Who has made these claims of genetic identical-ness? You’re attacking a bunch of positions while making one yourself about genes without actually having the genetic data. Why do this? Why presume superiority and inferiority on average without any data on what these genes actually are, and who has them? When this is contrary to the Scarr study, not consistent with the Flynn effect, when this just so happens to match the claims of pseudo-scientific racialists (who similarly have no genetic data to rely on)… why insist that this must be the explanation? Yes, I’m going to continue to be critical of people who insist that some groups are inherently inferior or superior on average with no supporting genetic data. It wouldn’t be hard to recreate the Scarr study, which bypasses the experimental problem of racism in society by _directly comparing black children to other black children_, but for some reason Murray (or Harris, for that matter) doesn’t seem interested in trying to do so. Neither do the other prominent supporters of some variation of this hypothesis. I’m going to continue to criticize this as long as it’s going on. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Economist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c89c15/32.png) [@Evil\_Economist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Economist)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/193 "2017-04-24T21:45:31Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > No comment so far by the Murray supporters about the Flynn effect. Do black Americans in the present have superior genetics for intelligence than white Americans from, say, a century ago? Did white American genes for intelligence greatly increase in the last century? Or is there another explanation for why IQ scores, on average, have improved over time (and thus another possible explanation for why IQ scores can differ between populations that isn’t based on genetics)? You don’t even need to go back a century. Black Americans are outperforming white Americans from tests taken less than 50 years ago. If some naive scientist were to accidently take current-day African American IQ tests and white American IQ tests from 1945, they would conclude that the white Americans had a genetic tendency to low IQ. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/194 "2017-04-24T21:45:59Z")
> [@mr.jp](#): > > Nothing here is an argument against anything Murray has said in The Bell Curve. Murray says that genes must be part of the explanation. Why must genes be part of the explanation when we don’t know anything about the genes for high and low intelligence? And why must they be part of the explanation when the Flynn effect demonstrates that it’s entirely possible for two populations with the same overall genetics can have different average IQ test scores? ---
**Author:** ![Salvor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Salvor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Salvor)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/195 "2017-04-24T21:48:32Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > As I said, if \*\*Salvor \*\*comes defending you I know where he is confirming to all to belong. BTW no one here has complained about using genes to increase intelligence if that is ever found. So his monumental tirade was also a monumental straw man. > > (Unfortunately, studies that have been ignored even here point to the likelihood that not a single gene or even a group of them is responsible, but the work in conjunction with many of them, so we are talking many years into the future regarding gene therapy if that is found) It’s probably thousands of gene contributions, just like height. But with we are not as far off from tackling that problem as you might expect. [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/v5ANweXCptM/maxresdefault.jpg "Steven Pinker, Stephen Hsu and Dalton Conley: Can Genius Be Genetically Engineered?") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5ANweXCptM) ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/196 "2017-04-24T21:50:43Z")
I welcome actual science that discovers the genes that are really tied to high and low intelligence, whenever this occurs. That’s a good thing, not a bad thing. I’m mystified that so many insist on making conclusions on genetics and intelligence in different populations when we don’t have this information. ---
**Author:** ![Salvor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Salvor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Salvor)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/197 "2017-04-24T21:52:41Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > No comment so far by the Murray supporters about the Flynn effect. Do black Americans in the present have superior genetics for intelligence than white Americans from, say, a century ago? Did white American genes for intelligence greatly increase in the last century? Or is there another explanation for why IQ scores, on average, have improved over time (and thus another possible explanation for why IQ scores can differ between populations that isn’t based on genetics)? The flynn effect suggests there are some environmental effects taking place, the problem is that gaps tend to persist over time between groups so it is not enough to say that if we vary the environment we can close gaps based off the flynn effect. But it’s not hard to imagine that some environmental stimuli could modify something like spacial reasoning on iq tests. Todays kids and kids for the past 30 years have been playing video games or rotating virtual objects in 3d space, I’d imagine any kid growing up in that world would have spacial reasoning that was higher than the typical child growing up on the prairie a hundred years ago. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/198 "2017-04-24T21:53:20Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > Hardly anything significant is built by a single gene. So? So his points were not “awesome” but mostly ignorant, not to mention not much to the point of the thread not what Harris and Murray discussed. ---
**Author:** ![mr.jp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/48db29/32.png) [@mr.jp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mr.jp)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/199 "2017-04-24T21:54:12Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Murray says that genes must be part of the explanation. Why must genes be part of the explanation when we don’t know anything about the genes for high and low intelligence? And why must they be part of the explanation when the Flynn effect demonstrates that it’s entirely possible for two populations with the same overall genetics can have different average IQ test scores? Murray in The Bell Curve says that it’s highly likely that genes are part of the explanation, not that they must be. We do know about genes that influence intelligence. Genes are likely part of the explanation, because genetic differences have effects. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Economist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c89c15/32.png) [@Evil\_Economist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Economist)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2017, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052/200 "2017-04-24T21:54:17Z")
> [@Salvor](#): > > The flynn effect suggests there are some environmental effects taking place, the problem is that gaps tend to persist over time between groups so it is not enough to say that if we vary the environment we can close gaps based off the flynn effect. When you say “persist” what do you mean? Because the gap between African Americans and white Americas has been shrinking, which seems like the opposite of “persist”. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052.md?page=9) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-podcast-conversation-between-sam-harris-and-charles-murray-of-bell-curve-fame/785052.md?page=11)