Do You Pass The Gilder Test?

What our reactions reveal

George Gilder’s 2009 book The Israel Test posits that the character of an individual can be measured by their response to those whose success is greater than their own. It was written in response to a growing criticism of Israel at the outset of the Obama administration, a president who seemingly held contempt for any form of exceptionalism other than his own personal brand, which Gilder rightly assessed was rooted in a resentment of the success of others. 

A similar test could likely be applied to the appraisal of Gilder himself, who despite having an extremely impressive curriculum vitae, was virtually unknown to the many thirty-something-year-old men (myself included) who follow the reformed Twittersphere, until a recent controversy over some quotes from the upcoming republication of his 1986 book Men and Marriage, with Canon Press.

Chief amongst these shocking quotes was the claim that “the prime fact of life is the sexual superiority of women”. To a group of men who are absolutely besotted with St. Paul’s declaration that the husband is the head of the wife, this claim seems like absurd feminist nonsense. This sparked a fair bit of curiosity as to why our favorite grumpy uncle, Doug Wilson was promoting such a work. While some folks seem to have the good sense to wait until they are able to read the book for themselves, more than a few have decided to relegate poor Douglass to the longhouse with a roll of the eyes and an “Ok, Boomer”.

Having already internalized the core sentiment of The Israel Test (though I didn’t know the name at the time), my curiosity was ultimately piqued not by any of the promotional material from Canon Press, but by this uproarious dismissal of a public intellectual that no one in my generation knew, but who received high praise from Uncle Doug. 

So began a (relatively) deep dive into YouTube, Canon Plus and the local library to learn more about this intriguing individual. What I learned is that George Gilder is primarily an economist. He’s really a polymath - but not the dangerous type like Aristotle, where even highly intelligent people can’t tell the good ideas from the bad ones and so we keep trying to test them for thousands of years.

Perhaps we could chalk up his quirky takes on marriage to a weak spot in his theory of everything; after all he’s not technically a psychologist or relationship expert, nor a theologian, and so perhaps his thesis could be corrected by a little bit of better exegesis. But upon closer inspection, it seems that his take is perfectly biblical, when viewed from the economic point of view. 

Gilder’s economic model is one of super-abundance, altruism, and a knowledge-based theory of wealth creation. It’s basically the monetary equivalent of post-millennial eschatology - which explains why he’s had such a profound influence on Wilson. You’d be hard pressed to find another 83 year old who is both as knowledgeable and excited about topics such as Artificial Intelligence and the Blockchain, and it’s refreshing to hear an optimistic voice regarding technological issues that are usually viewed as harbingers of the apocalypse, even by those who vehemently denounce the errors of dispensationalism.

So what does Gilder’s book on marriage have to do with his greater interest in economic theory, and how does it fit with the Bible? 

Let’s start with Genesis 1:28, and we’ll move onto the headship issue momentarily. For the unconvinced, I’ve posted a more thorough, albeit rougher and rambling expose on these issues here.

The creation mandate implores us to multiply and subdue - and an economists chief concern of multiplication is in regard to wealth - which Gilder ties to the increase of knowledge (which is why he writes books and we should read them), but his model of superabundance also predicts an increase in wealth with a greater population, and every exegete agrees that this is perfectly in line with God’s words in Genesis. Like most economic problems, a little bit of simple math might make things clear: 

If we crunch the numbers on human population growth, we will find that there is a permanent bottleneck - human population cannot grow at a rate that exceeds 1 baby per 1 fertile woman, every 9 months. With the exception of outliers (twins), this bottleneck is inescapable. 

God created marriage in the form of a monogamous and lifelong union, between one man and one woman. But after one bad seminar with a snake in the garden, humans have been asking this one question - “Did God really say that?” about anything and everything, including the marriage arrangement. 

Ever the empiricists, it is the males of our species (acting as the head) who have looked to the practice of other creatures for inspiration, and have emulated the behavior of polygynous species, when acting like beasts, and even polyandrous species, when living like insects, in an effort to circumvent and improve on God’s monogamous design. But these alternatives caused a heap of new problems with no increase in the rate of population growth. And despite the creative employment of all manner of techniques and tonics, the sex of new children born remains at a consistent 50/50 ratio of males to females. 

Any farmer will tell you about the sexual superiority of females - just ask what they do with all the male calves. Sadly there have been times when humans found themselves burdened with an excess of young barbarians, and they employed a similar solution; pastors rarely preach on the fact that the king's feast offered to Daniel and his friends, was a consolation prize exchanged for a future devoid of fatherhood. 

Gilder realized that this superiority of women (the fact that they can actually produce offspring) was best utilized and had the highest economic value within the monogamous system that God first instructed us to follow, not only for the man and wife, but for society as a whole. If the parlance of “superiority” ruffles the feathers of a few small town patriarchs, consider to whom he was speaking; feminists demanding equality. If someone says “we want equality” and the response is “you are superior!”, it betrays the fact that what feminism actually does is degrade and downplay the significance of women - something that the last several decades have made abundantly clear, and articulated very well in recent years by liberal women such as Louise Perry and Mary Harrington.

If the reader is unfamiliar with those names, it might benefit them to stick their neck out past their own backwoods echo chamber and take a look at what’s been happening in the broader culture. The nomenclature of Christianity is being abandoned, but the underlying truths are cropping up in all sorts of unexpected places. 

There’s unauthorized exorcists out there, and they look an awful lot like a young George Gilder. Watching his appearance on The Dick Cavett Show, being harassed by lesbian feminists, and the story of his publishing woes shared on Man Rampant are both eerily familiar to anyone who’s been following the story around Jordan Peterson. He certainly doesn’t have all his exegesis figured out, but he’s regularly sending young men to church. 

The response to Gilder among the reformed/postmillennial/CN crowd is not a unique phenomenon. Similar takes can be found amongst young men in a variety of spiritual enclaves when confronted with one more elder statesman they are supposed to take seriously; the OrthoBros, the Trad Caths, the Lutherans, probably even the Pentecostals - it's a universal instinct to challenge the old guard, when the next generation is excited to grab the reins and employ new ideas. 

But the Gilder test should cause us to pause and consider, is there really nothing I can gain from listening to this man? And if we are tempted to chalk up all their success to one more tale of a privileged boomer, born in the right place and the right time, because we hear it from our peers, are we not putting ourselves in the place of Rehoboam? Are we quick to dismiss the wisdom of our father’s generation because we are so certain of the wisdom of our peers, or because we resent their success, and are eager to prove them foolish? 

When we are confronted with an unfamiliar person like George Gilder who has excelled us in invention, creativity and wealth, do we respond with admiration, or resentment?

I’ve passed the Gilder test. Can you?