This is the first in a four-course track exploring Objectivism as a system of philosophy. This course focuses on Objectivism’s distinctive conception of philosophy and its role in human life, including what a proper philosophical methodology looks like.
In this second course, we focus on the core of the Objectivist metaphysics and epistemology. We will explore the distinctions between the metaphysically given and the man-made, the axioms of existence, consciousness, and identity, and their implications for understanding reality.
In this third course, we will explore Objectivism’s approach to concept-formation, definitions, logic, and the relationship between reason and emotions. We begin with Rand’s take on the problem of universals and the process of concept formation.
The final course in this four-course track focuses on moral virtues, happiness, the rejection of force, and Objectivism’s view of art. We will discuss the virtues of independence, integrity, honesty, justice, productiveness, and pride, and relate them back to the “master” virtue: rationality.
Through this four-course track, you’ll gain a better understanding of the principles of Objectivism, including some of its advice about proper philosophical methodology. The cash value is that philosophy can become more fully an aid to your own life, thinking, work and happiness.
This course teaches the basic principles and methods of objective communication. We’ll treat communication as a science, as a skill that has certain objective principles that can be learned and applied to the improvement of one’s work.
Taking your life seriously requires taking work seriously. In this course, you will learn the principles and attitudes that will guide you in your work, your career, and in the world of business.
Ayn Rand was interested in conveying her ideas to new audiences; we at ARI are too. More widely, learning to effectively communicate your ideas to new audiences is an important skill to learn. This course focuses on some of the principles and practice of effective oral communication.
To understand Rand’s philosophy one must give careful consideration to the content and meaning of her novels. This course provides a powerful corrective to a tendency among students of Objectivism to neglect Rand’s fiction in their study of the philosophy.
To understand Rand’s philosophy one must give careful consideration to the content and meaning of her novels. This course provides a powerful corrective to a tendency among students of Objectivism to neglect Rand’s fiction in their study of the philosophy.
This is a two-quarter seminar exploring Objectivism in depth. Its goal is to help you learn how to better understand and “chew” various principles of Objectivism and philosophical issues more generally.
This course offers a moral defense of finance and financiers. It methodically examines the vital role they serve in the economy. And it explores the philosophical ideas that make the attacks on financial markets possible and why the profit motive is the only moral and practical motive for financial transactions.
In this course, we will examine contemporary philosophical perspectives on work and labor through the 20th century to the present, contrasting important themes from academic philosophers’ work with that of Rand.
This course explores Karl Popper’s “critical rationalist” philosophy. We will examine and challenge the assumptions that lead Popper to conclude that induction is a myth.
One of the most influential thinkers of all time. The political movement for which millions were ready to kill, and die for. Welcome to the ARU course on Karl Marx and communism! Together, we will get a firm grip on the basic ideas of Marx around capitalism, history, and human nature.
This course, led by Nikos Sotirakopoulos, will follow the intellectual and political developments of the Left from the 1960s until today.
In this course, members of the ARU Graduate Center explore advanced topics in Objectivism and philosophy that relate to the subject matter areas in which they are developing expertise.
In this invitation-only course, Harry Binswanger and Yaron Brook lead advanced workshops on public speaking for developing Objectivist intellectuals aspiring to speak at OCON, ARI’s annual summer conference.
This course will trace the development of optics, electricity, and magnetism from their rudimentary beginnings as unrelated areas of study all the way up to their surprising integration in the work of James Clerk Maxwell.
The Man Who Laughs, according to Ayn Rand, was the best novel ever written by Victor Hugo, her favorite novelist. Together, we will see why she was right.
Goethe’s dramatic poem Faust is a monumental work of literature that takes the reader on a journey “from Heaven through the World to Hell.” In exquisite and memorable verse, it tells the story of a Medieval scholar who—frustrated with the limitations of human knowledge—enters into a bargain with the Devil in order to experience “all that is the lot of human kind.”
In this invitation-only seminar, ARU Honors Students develop their thinking, writing and research skills by engaging in research projects in a specific area of philosophical interest. The students receive regular feedback on their work from ARI senior fellows.
Writing is a skill, a creative activity. As such, it cannot be learned primarily by reading a textbook or listening to lectures. One learns to write by writing . . . and writing and writing and writing. This course builds on the skills acquired and lessons learned in Introduction to Writing.
Ayn Rand embraced Aristotelian logic but took it much further. This course reviews the three most important ideas of Aristotelian logic and then focuses on the new principles of proper thinking developed by Ayn Rand.
Purchase access to the full curriculum offering for two years. Students are eligible to apply for scholarships to defray the cost of tuition, though anyone interested in learning with us may pay tuition and join the courses.
To understand Rand’s distinctive worldview and to learn her new philosophy, Objectivism, there is no better place to start than with careful consideration of the content and meaning of her novels, which contain the richest treatment of central principles of Objectivism available.
To understand Rand’s distinctive worldview and to learn her new philosophy, Objectivism, there is no better place to start than with careful consideration of the content and meaning of her novels, which contain the richest treatment of central principles of Objectivism available.
Rand held that art, particularly literature, was indispensable in depicting a moral ideal, her own new moral ideal emphatically included. Through examining Rand’s fiction we will learn about her new vision of the ideal.
Short Description