“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.
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.
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.”
On June 10, 2015, ARI’s Distinguished Fellow Peter Schwartz gave a talk in New York City at the City University of New York’s Graduate Center. In his talk, Peter discussed the ideas in his new book, In Defense of Selfishness: Why the Code of Self-Sacrifice Is Unjust and Destructive. Peter’s talk, which was delivered as a part of ARI’s Road to a Free Society tour, was recorded by C-SPAN and is now available online.
On this Monday’s episode of The Yaron Brook Show, Yaron will give his take on the growing “social justice” movement. Don’t miss this controversial conversation.
If you haven’t pre-ordered your copy of In Defense of Selfishness: Why the Code of Self-Sacrifice Is Unjust and Destructive, by Peter Schwartz, to be published on June 2, 2015, please do so today. As a special inducement to those who pre-order the book on or before May 8, ARI is arranging an exclusive Q&A webinar, to be held in August. You’ll have the opportunity to ask Mr. Schwartz questions about the material in his book.
