As much as we might think we're in a "post-everything" time right now, the problem stems from legitimate racism still being right behind us in history. There is no person on this planet that I have more respect for than an old African American woman. Fifty years, a hundred years, isn't that long ago in terms of social science and real change. We can't force change. The racists are getting older and fewer. The way i see it is we still need another two or three generations before it's truly gone.

What I learned from that episode and the kerfuffling on this board afterwords was The Bell Curve is not about what we thought it was about. It's about the subtext: "Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life." The entire book is about the American environment and classism. Classicism, ghettoization, wealth inequality are the focus. A big part of the push in that book is contrary to what we heard, fighting for the underprivileged in society.

Intelligence is varietal, not fixed. IQ scores are one dimension among multiple. Brilliant people can have low or average IQ scores.

So the entire thing, before any conclusions are drawn, is 30 year old science. Science progresses and updates itself.

Another problem is the sensationalism – the assumptions that that book Herrnstein & Murray wrote is a book specifically about Race/IQ. Taking the most offensive sound bytes and peripheral science and making it the centerpiece by loudly objecting to it. The uproar makes you think it must have some weight to it if people are getting this upset, but it's just adding to the dissonance.