THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, September 15, 1995 TAG: 9509150513
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY DENISE WATSON, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 81 lines
Thousands filled the Old Dominion University field house Thursday night for a thorough deliberation on the relationship between race, class, genes and intelligence. And that is what they got. Sort of.
The debate between Charles Murray, co-author of last year's controversial ``The Bell Curve,'' and Harvard psychiatrist Alvin Poussaint tackled Murray's work but with very different interpretations of the book.
Murray opened by saying that the intent of the 855-page volume was to illuminate the growing schism between society's haves - a technologically inclined elite - and its have-nots, relegated to low-paying manual labor. That intent has often been misconstrued by the media, he argued.
``You've heard that the book is about racial differences in IQ, right? . .
``We talk about those issues in the book, but we say emphatically that they are not important.''
Poussaint accused Murray of downplaying the implications of the ``The Bell Curve,'' particularly Chapter 13, which compares the IQ tests of varying ethnic groups. Poussaint said the book paints African Americans as intellectually inferior to whites and suggests that this inequity is passed on primarily through genes.
``If he can get a group of white people who've been through 250 years of slavery and 100 years of segregation and suppression, then we might be able to compare,'' Poussaint said to a smattering of applause.
``Less than 30 years have we been released from bondage. In 1964 and '65, they started to dismantle segregation. . . . And we're supposed to be on the same level with people who have had privilege and access.''
``The Bell Curve'' attracted controversy months before it was released last fall. The book examines several issues, from unemployment to affirmative action, but the furor centered on the discussion of intellectual differences among ethnic groups. The authors said that up 60 percent of such differences are hereditary.
Some critics felt Murray and his co-author, the late Richard Herrnstein, attached too little importance to environmental and cultural factors in human development. Others argued that much of the book's research was outdated and flawed.
For many, the mention of a connection between race, genes and intelligence opened old and ugly wounds.
It revived historical arguments of blacks being intellectually inadequate, arguments once used to rationalized slavery and Jim Crow practices.
About 50 people demonstrated in front of the gym before the debate, chanting, ``Trying to get some equality!'' and carrying signs saying, ``End U.S. Apartheid,'' and ``End Racist Scapegoating.''
Murray said Thursday night that the book did draw distinctions between ethnic groups, but he added: ``The fact that something is heritable doesn't mean that a group difference is heritable.''
For example, he said, take two identical handfuls of corn and plant one in Iowa and the other in the desert.
``You'd get two different results even though the corn is heritable.''
Yvonne Young, 20-year-old ODU student, said she found the analogy confusing.
``I've tried to read the book and I found it difficult to decipher,'' Young said.
``I thought seeing the debate would help me understand it. It hasn't.''
Murray and Poussaint didn't take each other on point by point.
Poussaint stressed the importance of cultural influences on human behavior and of not labeling people based on IQ scores.
Murray continually warned that America must pay attention to a ``cognitive elite'' that will remain on top economically while a growing underclass flounders at the bottom.
``A lot of the country will make it just fine,'' Murray said.
``But it probably won't be the America we want, a country we'll recognize.'' ILLUSTRATION: CHRISTOPHER REDDICK
Staff
Charles Murray, left, co-author of last year's controversial ``The
Bell Curve,'' and Harvard psychiatrist Alvin Poussaint debated
Murray's work at Old Dominion University Thursday night.
by CNB