Dennis Prager interviews author Human Accomplishment.

In this thought-provoking episode of The Dennis Prager Show, host Dennis Prager interviews Charles Murray, author of *Human Accomplishment: The Pursuit of Excellence in the Arts and Sciences, 800 B.C. to 1950*. The conversation centers on Murray’s ambitious attempt to objectively assess human greatness across history, focusing on the arts and sciences. Prager and Murray debate the nature of excellence, the role of expertise, and the cultural conditions that foster greatness—particularly the unique historical dominance of Europe from 1400 to 1950. They explore how Western individualism, Christian theology (especially the Catholic tradition and Thomas Aquinas), and a belief in the meaning of this life created a fertile environment for scientific and artistic breakthroughs. Murray argues that the decline in greatness since the 19th century stems from the rejection of transcendental goods—truth, beauty, and the good—and a cultural adolescence marked by Enlightenment rationalism, Darwinism, Freudianism, and Einsteinian upheavals. Prager reflects on the spiritual underpinnings of greatness, noting that even as an agnostic, he finds the absence of God a profound barrier to enduring excellence. The discussion also touches on gender, with Murray highlighting how motherhood’s demands historically limited women’s capacity for monomaniacal dedication to creative work. Both agree that a cultural reckoning is underway, with intellectuals slowly returning to deep existential questions about meaning and purpose.