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What Went Wrong? Reflections on Science by Observation and The Bell Curve

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2022

Clark Glymour
Clark Glymour*
Affiliation:
Departments of Philosophy, University of California-San Diego, Carnegie Mellon University
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Abstract

The Bell Curve aims to establish a set of causal claims. I argue that the methodology of The Bell Curve is typical of much of contemporary social science and is intrinsically defective. I claim better methods are available for causal inference from observational data, but that those methods would yield no causal conclusions from the data used in the formal analyses in The Bell Curve. Against the laissez-faire social policies advocated in the book, I claim that when combined with common sense and other information, the informal data mustered in The Bell Curve support a range of “liberal” social policies.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 65 , Issue 1 , March 1998 , pp. 1 - 32
Copyright
Copyright © Philosophy of Science Association 1998

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Footnotes

†

Send reprint requests to the author, Department of Philosophy, University of California-San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093

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