|
|
Human Accomplishment: The Pursuit of Excellence in the Arts
and Sciences, 800 B.C. to 1950, by Charles Murray. HarperCollins,
2003, 668 pages.
Scorecard for
Achievement by Andrew W.
Jones
Only a few decades ago, the academy stood as the
institutional embodiment of the Western pursuit of truth. Scholars researched,
reasoned, theorized, debated, and, eventually, reached consensus. If an object of
consensus stood the test of time and weathered attempts at its falsification, it
could come to be understood as true. In the hard sciences, the scientific method
and strict standards of replication have, for the most part, preserved this quest
for truth; the social sciences and humanities have not fared so well. It is hard,
after all, to maintain that the launching of the space shuttle is simply a
manifestation of the ingrained bias of the scientists, and a fulfillment only of
the arbitrary standards of the Western scientific canon. The social sciences and
the humanities, lacking such kick-the-rock-to-prove-its-existence
demonstrations, demanded of scholars a self-conscious awareness of bias and
fallibility.
| | Andrew W.
Jones is an assistant editor of Liberty. |
|
Since the Second World War, this awareness of bias and fallibility has morphed
into the denial of the existence of truth. To recent theorists, that individuals,
and through them cultures, disagree on what is and is not true, is evidence that
truth does not exist (ignoring, of course, that all involved agree that there
exists something to disagree about). History is one of the more recent
disciplines to tumble into this relativistic abyss; intellectual and art history,
being culturally the heaviest, sunk the fastest. When truth is mentioned at all,
it is in a mocking tone, with obligatory quotation marks.
In "Human Accomplishment," Charles Murray once again challenges this new
consensus. He argues that accomplishments can be measured by evaluating the
judgments, as opposed to the sentiments, of experts. As he and co-author Richard
Herrnstein did in "The Bell Curve," Murray compiles indexes of accomplishment. An
artist's or scientist's position on the index is determined by the amount of
attention given him in serious histories, from which Murray excludes postmodern
analysis, which he considers "silly." He defends his selection of experts by
asserting that he allies himself not with a particular school, but "with a view
of the nature of inquiry that can without strain encompass everyone from
Aristotle and Confucius to Hume, Kant and beyond." |
| Since the Second World
War, an awareness of bias and fallibility has morphed into the denial of the
existence of truth. |
|
Ever conscious of objections, Murray covers his rear, devoting sections to the
possible effects of Eurocentrism, sexism, racism, chauvinism, and elitism. Ceding
that a worldwide compilation for the arts poses problems, he creates separate
inventories for Chinese, Japanese, Arab, and Western artists. For the sciences
and mathematics, however, he argues that "a bamboo bridge over a Chinese canal
and a stone bridge over a Dutch canal both carry their loads because of the same
laws of physics," and groups all cultures together.
Murray's initial analysis of these inventories produces an interesting, if not
all that surprising, result: European urban males occupy the majority of spots.
Interestingly, the contribution of the Jews during the past century and a half is
disproportionately significant. Prior to the mid-19th century it was almost
nonexistent. After the revolutions of 1848 and the Jews' legal emancipation
throughout much of Europe, accomplishments by Jews increased to a level well
beyond what their percentage of the population would suggest. Murray suspects
that this poses a problem for those who solely blame cultural discrimination for
other minorities' low numbers.
Murray argues that the nature of accomplishment in a given time and place can
be accurately predicted given information about that culture's status with regard
to four dimensions: purpose, autonomy, organizing structure, and transcendental
goods. While he explains each dimension in great depth, his essential point is
that people who believe their life has purpose, who acknowledge a difference
between good and bad, whose culture allows them freedom and has organizing
structures (e.g., symphonies and universities), tend to out-perform those who are
stifled by cultures that put emphasis on familial obligations, duty, and
consensus. Nothing too surprising.
| Murray argues that
accomplishments can be measured by evaluating the judgments, as opposed to the
sentiments, of experts. |
|
What is surprising is Murray's contention that accomplishment is in sharp
decline, and has been for at least a century. By using multiple regression
analyses, he demonstrates that while the absolute number of significant
individuals continues to rise, when adjusted for population increases,
accomplishment is in decline. This decline is amplified when one takes into
account how many more people are born into a family whose social status allows
for the possibility of accomplishment (that is, non-peasant). In the sciences, he
employs the metaphor of a jigsaw puzzle: most of the large pieces have already
been laid, and all that remains is to fill in the spaces. In the arts, he blames
the loss of purpose and transcendental goods, so exemplified in the creed of the
postmodernists. Such "end of history" talk is rightfully viewed as dubious, and
Murray makes a point to acknowledge how wrong he could be.
The problems that people are trying to solve vary with time, place, and
culture. This makes it difficult to evaluate their success in solving those
problems. But, to accept such difficulty does not entail denying the existence of
truth. And the problems of physical suffering and the productivity of labor are
universal questions of survival, shared with the animal kingdom, and it is
manifest that objective gains have been made toward solutions: the smallpox
vaccine works as well on an African as it does on an Englishman, and a tractor
outperforms an ox anytime, anyplace. The problem of discerning truth in other
areas of human endeavor must be viewed as a problem in understanding, not as
evidence that truth does not exist.
In the end, "Human Accomplishment" triumphs, not so much in its analysis,
which often falls a little flat or seems tautological, but as a line in the sand.
Murray challenges those who shout "white male bias!" to "specify the names and
contributions of the large numbers of important Asian and Arabic scientists and
mathematicians who have been left out, or to explain why some thousands of the
European entries don't belong." He has compiled such a compelling amount of data
and analysis that the only way to undermine his thesis is to renounce the concept
of progress — not the 19th-century, "Great Exhibition" notion of progress,
but the idea that mankind now knows more about the universe than it once did.
Such an attack has to maintain that knowledge itself is an arbitrary human
construct. Such an abandonment of the millennia-old search for truth can only
escape its inherent paradoxes through capitulation to nihilism. And, as Murray
puts it, "the same people who tell us there is no such thing as objective truth
get on airplanes without a second thought." That is, of course, after theorizing
themselves out of a job.
|
| | |
|
