In her preface to For the New Intellectual, Ayn Rand writes: "I am often asked whether I am primarily a novelist or a philosopher. The answer is: both." All novelists are philosophers to some degree; ...

More than four decades after her death, the author of the popular novels Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead is still one of the most divisive public intellectuals. On one hand, her position of ...

“Ayn Rand’s “philosophy” is nearly perfect in its immorality, which makes the size of her audience all the more ominous and symptomatic as we enter a curious new phase in our society….To justify and ...

With Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul having recently announced his intention to be the next U.S. president (an announcement he delivered, incidentally, from Louisville’s Galt House Hotel), now seems as good a ...

This article was published in Scientific American’s former blog network and reflects the views of the author, not necessarily those of Scientific American “Every political philosophy has to begin with ...