What is happiness? And how can we achieve it? In this interview with Tara Smith, professor of philosophy at the University of Texas at Austin, we learn about the link between philosophy and happiness; the need for purpose and self-esteem; how to discover what will make you happy; whether money will buy you happiness; and other topics.
“There is a fundamental moral difference between a man who sees his self-interest in production and a man who sees it in robbery. The evil of a robber does not lie in the fact that he pursues his own interests, but in what he regards as to his own interest. . .”
Peter Schwartz, distinguished fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute, reflects in this 2014 Washington Post op-ed, on why platitudes like “give back” or “remember the needy,” don’t represent his perspective on the Christmas season.
In this episode of Selfish for Success, Steve Orma, a psychologist specializing in insomnia and anxiety, interviews philosopher Onkar Ghate. In the interview they discuss typical confusions about selfishness; the objective conditions for a flourishing life; the need to critically question conventional morality; and, the nobility of businessmen.
Although Ayn Rand is virtually unknown in France, the release of the French edition of Atlas Shrugged (La Grève) in paperback this March has sparked a burst of interest in Rand in the French media.
Voices for Reason is a blog that covers a wide range of topics, including philosophy and its application to current events, programs of the Ayn Rand Institute and the ideas of Objectivism. Looking back on the year, here are 2016’s most-read blog posts (along with edited versions of the introductions that accompanied them at time of publication).
On June 1 and June 2, 2016, Yaron Brook, Steve Simpson and Tara Smith attended the 2016 Foundations of a Free Society Conference at Clemson University, hosted by the Clemson Institute for the Study of Capitalism.
Aaron Smith, a philosopher at ARI, recently published “Ayn Rand: A New Concept of Egoism,” an essay introducing Rand's unique approach to self-interest, in De Filosoof (“The Philosopher”), the quarterly magazine of the Department of Philosophy and Religion at Utrecht University in the Netherlands.
On May 6, 2016, David Rubin on Ora.TV’s The Rubin Report interviewed ARI’s executive director, Yaron Brook. In this extensive interview Dr. Brook discusses topics such as the life, works and philosophy of Ayn Rand, the failure of our public education system, the meaning of rational selfishness, the value of free trade and labor-saving machines and the cause of cronyism and government controls.
This Sunday is Valentine’s Day, a holiday on which we celebrate romantic love. But, what exactly is romantic love? According to Ayn Rand, “Love is a response to values. . . . One falls in love with the embodiment of the values that formed a person’s character, which are reflected in his widest goals or smallest gestures, which create the style of his soul — the individual style of a unique, unrepeatable, irreplaceable consciousness.”
