Where Scientists Fear to Tread by Gordon Tullock

The Creative Elite in America, by Nathaniel Weyl. Public Affairs Press, $6.00

Mr. Weyl is a very brave man. In this book he violates a whole series of major intellectual taboos. This fact, taken together with his general reputation, is surely going to lead to shrill and biased attacks on his book from the Establishment. Since my review will also contain some — serious criticism, I should like to start by saying that I do not object to his investigating the possibility that certain ethnic groups are genetically superior to others. In fact, I think that more such research should be done. The nature versus nurture controversy has been going on in theoretical ‘terms for a long time now. It should be possible to end the argument by empirical investigation. Nor do I have any great objection to his ultimate conclusions, that certain groups (Jews, Scots and Chinese) are indeed superior. It happens to be my opinion that no significant genetic differences between ethnic groups exist, but I am aware of the fact that this is only an opinion. The evidence on the point is not now so strong that anyone can be sure. My objections to Weyl’s research, then, are not just an expression of bias on my part. Weyl’s basic method is both simple and ingenious. As he points out, the basic idea had been independently discovered by Huntingdon. The Social Security Administration has published a list of the most common 1514 names on its rolls, together with the number of people bearing each name. Some of these names—Wong, Cohen, and Wilson, for example—are fairly unambiguously associated with a definite ethnic group. He computes the percentage of the total population which have, say, German names. The next step is to take some large list of people who have elite status in our society. American Men of Science would be one such list. Weyl works out the percentage of people on that list who have the same set of German names. If the percentage of people having the German names is higher in American Men of Science than in the Social Security Administration list, then he concludes that Germans are making a more than proportionate contribution to the development of science. There are some further elaborations, which I will not go into here, but the major part of the book is devoted to an examination of the results of such comparisons. He has accumulated 37 elite lists, ranging from the social register to members of Phi Beta Kappa, and the general pattern which comes out of these data is one of clear-cut Jewish superiority. Weyl explains this through selection of the intellectually superior for survival in the long Jewish oppression in the ghettos and the pale. The lesser superiority of the Scots and Chinese is also explained by genetic factors. The basic approach is, I think, sound, but there are a number of very serious objections to Weyl’s use of it. The first which comes to mind is simply that children take the names of their fathers, and German men sometimes marry Irish girls. Names are, thus, less than perfect indicators of ethnic background. This objection is less important than it at first appears, however, because there is a good deal of intra-group marriage, particularly among Jews. Still, I would have appreciated more discussion of the problem than Weyl provides. In part, however, this weakness is not his fault. No one investigator can cover everything. Weyl depends upon the work of others in this area, and there isn’t very much work available. Further, sophisticated statistical techniques should be able to provide some information even if there is a great deal of intermarriage. This, however, brings us to a more fundamental weakness in Weyl’s book, his rather old-fashioned approach to statistics. At one point he says that his “data can be subjected to statistical tests of significance” but he does not give any such test. Reading between the lines, I think he regarded any correlation as significant if it involved five or more observations. This is clearly a gravely inadequate test. If he did use it, he must have many correlations which he considers significant which are the result of mere chance. Given the way he presents his data it is impossible to tell which these are. Further, he. shows no sign of even knowing about the more sophisticated techniques available for obtaining information from the sort of data he has collected. He has shown considerable ingenuity in obtaining data, but his analysis normally shows that he is not at home with mathematics. My final objection concerns his basic conclusion, that the differences between the ethnic groups are genetic. The family environment of a Jewish child is quite different from that experienced by a child brought up in an Irish household. If the Jewish adult is different from the Irish adult, how does that help us in deciding whether it was heredity or environment which caused the difference? Weyl discusses the issue seriously only once, and then devotes only a page to it. Here he points out that the superior academic performance of Jews could be explained either by greater inherent intelligence or by better motivation. He then suggests an experiment to find out which explanation is correct. For the rest of the book, however, he simply assumes that the differences are genetic, not the results of environmental differences. Actually, although he does not discuss the point, some of his data point toward environmental rather than genetic causes. There are several cases where ethnic groups changed their relative positions over rather short periods of time. It would be easier to explain these shifts as the result of changing habits of child-rearing than as mass mutations. Having been critical of Mr. Weyl’s book, I should like to close by pointing out that he has at least undertaken investigations in areas where other scholars have feared to tread. I do not think this is a good book, but if I were asked to name a better one in the field, I would be unable to do so. The general reader seeking enlightenment on the subject should not begin with Weyl. If, however, any scholar decides to try this area of research he should give The Creative Elite in America most careful attention.

GT

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Gordon Tullock

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The Creative Elite in America, by Nathaniel Weyl. Public Affairs Press, $6.00

Mr. Weyl is a very brave man. In this book he violates a whole series of major intellectual taboos. This fact, taken together with his general reputation, is surely going to lead to shrill and biased attacks on his book from the Establishment. Since my review will also contain some — serious criticism, I should like to start by saying that I do not object to his investigating the possibility that certain ethnic groups are genetically superior to others. In fact, I think that more such research should be done. The nature versus nurture controversy has been going on in theoretical ‘terms for a long time now. It should be possible to end the argument by empirical investigation. Nor do I have any great objection to his ultimate conclusions, that certain groups (Jews, Scots and Chinese) are indeed superior. It happens to be my opinion that no significant genetic differences between ethnic groups exist, but I am aware of the fact that this is only an opinion. The evidence on the point is not now so strong that anyone can be sure. My objections to Weyl’s research, then, are not just an expression of bias on my part. Weyl’s basic method is both simple and ingenious. As he points out, the basic idea had been independently discovered by Huntingdon. The Social Security Administration has published a list of the most common 1514 names on its rolls, together with the number of people bearing each name. Some of these names—Wong, Cohen, and Wilson, for example—are fairly unambiguously associated with a definite ethnic group. He computes the percentage of the total population which have, say, German names. The next step is to take some large list of people who have elite status in our society. American Men of Science would be one such list. Weyl works out the percentage of people on that list who have the same set of German names. If the percentage of people having the German names is higher in American Men of Science than in the Social Security Administration list, then he concludes that Germans are making a more than proportionate contribution to the development of science. There are some further elaborations, which I will not go into here, but the major part of the book is devoted to an examination of the results of such comparisons. He has accumulated 37 elite lists, ranging from the social register to members of Phi Beta Kappa, and the general pattern which comes out of these data is one of clear-cut Jewish superiority. Weyl explains this through selection of the intellectually superior for survival in the long Jewish oppression in the ghettos and the pale. The lesser superiority of the Scots and Chinese is also explained by genetic factors. The basic approach is, I think, sound, but there are a number of very serious objections to Weyl’s use of it. The first which comes to mind is simply that children take the names of their fathers, and German men sometimes marry Irish girls. Names are, thus, less than perfect indicators of ethnic background. This objection is less important than it at first appears, however, because there is a good deal of intra-group marriage, particularly among Jews. Still, I would have appreciated more discussion of the problem than Weyl provides. In part, however, this weakness is not his fault. No one investigator can cover everything. Weyl depends upon the work of others in this area, and there isn’t very much work available. Further, sophisticated statistical techniques should be able to provide some information even if there is a great deal of intermarriage. This, however, brings us to a more fundamental weakness in Weyl’s book, his rather old-fashioned approach to statistics. At one point he says that his “data can be subjected to statistical tests of significance” but he does not give any such test. Reading between the lines, I think he regarded any correlation as significant if it involved five or more observations. This is clearly a gravely inadequate test. If he did use it, he must have many correlations which he considers significant which are the result of mere chance. Given the way he presents his data it is impossible to tell which these are. Further, he. shows no sign of even knowing about the more sophisticated techniques available for obtaining information from the sort of data he has collected. He has shown considerable ingenuity in obtaining data, but his analysis normally shows that he is not at home with mathematics. My final objection concerns his basic conclusion, that the differences between the ethnic groups are genetic. The family environment of a Jewish child is quite different from that experienced by a child brought up in an Irish household. If the Jewish adult is different from the Irish adult, how does that help us in deciding whether it was heredity or environment which caused the difference? Weyl discusses the issue seriously only once, and then devotes only a page to it. Here he points out that the superior academic performance of Jews could be explained either by greater inherent intelligence or by better motivation. He then suggests an experiment to find out which explanation is correct. For the rest of the book, however, he simply assumes that the differences are genetic, not the results of environmental differences. Actually, although he does not discuss the point, some of his data point toward environmental rather than genetic causes. There are several cases where ethnic groups changed their relative positions over rather short periods of time. It would be easier to explain these shifts as the result of changing habits of child-rearing than as mass mutations. Having been critical of Mr. Weyl’s book, I should like to close by pointing out that he has at least undertaken investigations in areas where other scholars have feared to tread. I do not think this is a good book, but if I were asked to name a better one in the field, I would be unable to do so. The general reader seeking enlightenment on the subject should not begin with Weyl. If, however, any scholar decides to try this area of research he should give The Creative Elite in America most careful attention.