SOURCE: "Acting Smart," in National Review, New York, Vol. XLVI, No. 23, December 5, 1994, pp. 46-8.

[Wilson is an educator and author of Families, Schools, and Delinquency Prevention (1987). In the following essay, he favorably assesses The Bell Curve, contending that the book accurately reveals the differences in intelligence levels between racial groups and that low and high IQs actually determine success or failure in society.]

Serious readers will ask four main questions about The Bell Curve. Is it true that intelligence explains so much behavior? How can IQ produce this effect? If it does, is there anything we should do differently in public policy? And will this nexus affect race relations?

My answer to the first question is unequivocally yes. I first became aware of the significance of low IQ as a predictor of ordinary criminality when I collaborated with the late Richard Herrnstein in writing Crime and Human Nature...