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Optional Courses
All optional courses are available in both Session 1 and Session 2, so attendees
can maximize the number of courses they plan to attend. Optional courses are letter-coded (A–D, see our
Conference Schedule) by daily time slot and
duration. For instance, "A" courses meet four times during each session, 9–10 AM, for a total of four hours
of class time. Remember that you can only select one course from each letter group, A–D, per
session, so if you want to attend two "A" courses, for example, you must attend one in Session 1 and one in Session
2.
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Course Descriptions
A1S1, A1S2
Writing Objectively
Keith Lockitch
Fans of Ayn Rand’s ideas are often highly motivated to advance Objectivism in the culture through
writing. Drawing on six years of experience teaching writing to Objectivist students, Dr. Lockitch offers guidance on how to write
effectively and objectively.
This course covers the basic principles and methods of nonfiction writing, focusing on what Ayn
Rand called “middle range” writing—writing that is neither purely journalistic, nor purely theoretical, but which applies
philosophical abstractions to concrete issues and events.
Topics include: how to choose a subject and theme, how to assess and respect the audience’s context
of knowledge, how to organize one’s thinking during the writing process, how to make effective use of motivation and contrast, and
how to analyze an article to identify its theme and logical structure. Particular emphasis is placed on the importance of
objectivity in writing.
A2S1, A2S2
Luck in the Pursuit of Life: The Rational Egoist's Approach to Luck
Diana Hsieh
When most people speak of a businessman’s wealth as “good fortune” or wish a student “good luck”
before an exam, they are not speaking in mere idioms. People commonly regard their lives as driven by luck. That’s wrong, yet luck
undoubtedly affects us. So what is the practical significance of luck?
To answer that question, this course surveys common false views of luck, focusing on their effects
on a person’s ideas and actions. It then develops a proper view, drawing on the insights of Aristotle and Ayn Rand. While Rand’s
remarks in her essays are brief, a rich view of the role of luck in life can be unearthed from her novels.
By focusing on the ethics of luck, this course offers fresh insight into the practice of the
Objectivist virtues and reveals common errors about luck that hinder us in our pursuits.
A3S1, A3S2
Music in the 20th Century: Some Highlights and Low Points
Thomas Shoebotham
The twentieth century presents the listener with a tremendous variety of musical styles. It
includes some of the greatest works ever written—and some of the worst. Names such as Strauss, Rachmaninov and Barber appear
alongside Schoenberg, Boulez and Cage, creating contrasts unprecedented in music history.
This course presents an overview of twentieth-century art music—the good and the bad—and also
looks at some of the broader philosophic ideas that influenced composers during the last one hundred years. No technical or
theoretical knowledge is presupposed, although a brief review of the basic elements of music will be made in the first
lecture.
The course closes with an examination of promising trends in music toward “neo-Romanticism,” and the
increased interest by some recent composers in writing music that is accessible to general audiences of classical concerts.
A4S1, A4S2
The History of Ancient Greece: Athens in the Fifth Century
John David Lewis
Athens in the fifth century BC was fueled by enormous intellectual and artistic energy, guided
by the world’s first citizen government, and defended by a magnificent navy. She was the intellectual center of the Greek world,
the “school of Hellas.” This course first considers the political events of this century, beginning with the establishment of
the Athenian democracy ca. 508 BC, moving through the growth of the Athenian naval empire, pausing on its defeat in the
Peloponnesian War and ending with the death of Socrates in 399 BC. After establishing this political timeline, the course places
a special emphasis on cultural events, including the great tragedians and comedians, before turning to the philosophical conflict
between the new learning and the traditional belief in the gods. (Recommended reading: Aristophanes’ Clouds)
B1S1, B1S2
Modern Physics and Objective Reality
Eric Dennis
The received story of modern physics features a pioneering group of quantum theorists (Bohr,
Heisenberg, Born, Pauli) who showed that critical aspects of the atomic world are observer-created, vindicating subjectivism
by reference to what has become a bedrock of experimental science. This story, however, is undermined by a parallel lineage of
physicists (Einstein, de Broglie, Schrödinger, Bohm, Bell) whose climax came with David Bohm’s reformulation of quantum
mechanics in terms of an objective micro-world.
We contrast these two approaches to quantum theory in layman’s terms, focusing on how they each
explain key experiments and on what premises about the nature of explanation itself they each proceed from. Examining the
response of Bohm’s opponents will locate the real source of their worldview not in experimental discoveries, but in avant-garde
philosophy, which will help to elucidate contemporary disputes about scientific methodology at the frontier of physics.
B2S1, B2S2
The Distinctiveness of an Egoistic Foreign Policy
Elan Journo
In the area of foreign policy, almost all leading thinkers claim to seek our national
interest—but what is that, exactly? And which, if any, among the mainstream approaches in foreign policy can actually secure
our interests? Surveying major challenges and threats confronting the United States, this course considers the answers
offered by prominent voices in foreign policy and compares them to an approach informed by Ayn Rand’s ethics of egoism. The
aim is to identify the contours of an egoistic foreign policy and situate it alongside other views in current debates—mapping
out areas of similarity and difference.
Reading Winning the Unwinnable War prior to the course is strongly recommended. The
course covers new material that builds on that book.
B3S1, B3S2
Ayn Rand's Other Literary Treasures: The Hal Wallis Screenplays
Dina Schein Federman
In the 1940s Ayn Rand was under contract to famous Hollywood producer Hal Wallis, writing
screenplays based on other authors’ novels for possible film production. The purpose of this course is to acquaint the
audience with these new treasures, which sometimes differ so much from the originals that they arguably constitute new
works of fiction.
Depending on time, the course covers some or all of the adapted screenplays: “The House of
Mist,” “The Crying Sisters,” “You Came Along” and “Love Letters,” as well as the original work “Top Secret.”
Each screenplay bears the unique Ayn Rand stamp: an exciting plot, an unusual situation,
larger-than-life characters who are passionate valuers, and a serious, fundamental theme. Dr. Federman discusses these issues,
examines how the screenplays differ from the novels, and asks what a novel had to have in order for Miss Rand to agree to use
it as the basis of her screenplay.
B4S1, B4S2
Aristotle's Theory of Knowledge
Gregory Salmieri
More than anyone else, it was Aristotle who taught mankind to think. It is for this reason that
he is, as Ayn Rand once described him, “the philosophical Atlas who carries the whole of Western civilization on his shoulders.”
This course is an essentialized survey of Aristotle’s theory of knowledge. It relates it both to Objectivism and to the false
alternative between rationalism and empiricism and brings out some Aristotelian insights that are useful for directing one’s own
thinking.
Topics include: Aristotle’s theories of perception, concepts and the intermediate stage of
“experience”; the distinctively human, causal perspective on the world enabled by concepts and epitomized by science; his distinctions
between essence and accident, and between necessity and contingency; the methods of induction, deduction and definition, and the
crucial concept of a “middle term”; and his view of hierarchy and the related distinction between dialectical and demonstrative
arguments.
C1S1, C1S2
The Films of Howard Hawks: Integrity, Intelligence, Inspiration
Shoshana Milgram
Howard Hawks has been acclaimed as the only movie director to achieve greatness in every
genre—from Westerns to war stories, from effervescent comedies to intense dramas. His pictures are entertaining and uplifting.
In the Hawksian universe, happy endings are more than a Hollywood cliché: they are earned.
The course, which offers an overview of Hawks’s body of work, focuses on four films that
illustrate the triumph of efficacious rationality over arduous obstacles—To Have and Have Not, Only Angels Have
Wings, His Girl Friday and Rio Bravo—and on two films (Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and Monkey
Business) featuring Marilyn Monroe, whose performances, according to Ayn Rand, projected a “radiantly benevolent sense of
life, which cannot be faked.”
By grasping the meaning, method and merits of these classic American movies, we sharpen our
understanding, enhance our enjoyment and acquire skills and standards that enrich our appreciation of films as art.
[Substantially revised version of a course offered in 1999]
C2S1, C2S2
Moral Development in Education
Ray Girn
Morality is everywhere in K-12 education. It’s in a recess supervisor’s injunction to “be fair”;
it’s in a literature teacher’s emphasis on particular character traits; it’s in a principal’s decision to admonish certain
forms of self-expression and ignore others. No matter what school a child attends, in every lesson, academic policy, teacher
interaction and playground rule, he encounters some implicit standard of what it means to be good.
Is this a problem? Or is moral training inherently a part of a child’s education?
Drawing on anecdotes from his own experience as an educator, and focusing on the trait of
independence, Mr. Girn investigates the relationship between a child’s schooling and his moral development. He demonstrates that while it is improper for schools to explicitly teach moral theory, there is nevertheless a fundamental
integration between a child’s cognitive and moral development, and that a proper educational system facilitates this
integration.
C3S1, C3S2
The Enlightenment and the American Founding
C. Bradley Thompson
The Declaration of Independence is, as Abraham Lincoln once said, “the central idea” of
America “from which all the others radiate.” This course is an in-depth analysis of the Declaration and the moral foundations
of the American republic.
Dr. Thompson offers a close textual analysis of the Declaration within the broader context of
the Enlightenment and the American Revolution. He examines how Jefferson and the other Founders understood philosophical
concepts such as necessity, natural law, self-evident truths, despotism, justice, freedom, natural rights, equality, prudence,
self-interest, individualism, rule of law, sovereignty, representation, republicanism and constitutional government.
The course concludes with an examination of the flaws, inconsistencies and contradictions in the
Founders’ moral-political philosophy and the philosophic requirements necessary to correct their errors and complete the promise
of the American Revolution.
C4S1, C4S2
Economics (part 2): The Price System, Economic Coordination,
and the Division of Labor
Brian P. Simpson
In Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand, Leonard Peikoff says capitalism is
perishing because of a lack of a rational philosophy, not because of a lack of knowledge of economics. Given this, why
should Objectivists study economics? One reason: knowledge of economics can be integrated with Objectivist moral philosophy
to strengthen the defense of capitalism. This is part 2 of a multipart course on basic economics. The course is equivalent
to an introductory undergraduate economics course—taught from an Objectivist perspective. It refutes many fallacies taught
at the universities and demonstrates why it is important to have an understanding of economics. Part 2—which does not
require knowledge from part 1—will focus on how the actions of millions—even billions—of individuals are coordinated in the
division of labor. Topics include: the factors on which the division of labor depends; how prices are determined; uniformity
principles; and how rights violations undermine coordination in the economy.
D1S1, D1S2
Ancient Greek Conceptions of Love: Aphrodite to St. Paul
Robert Mayhew
Ayn Rand wrote that “one of the most evil consequences of mysticism . . . is the belief that
love is a matter of ‘the heart,’ not the mind, that love is an emotion independent of reason, that love is blind and impervious
to the power of philosophy.” This course will present a history of this conception of love in the ancient Greek world, and of
the unsuccessful but influential attempts by philosophers—Platonic, Aristotelian and Hellenistic—to resist it.
The course focuses on the following six (sets of) texts: archaic Hymns to Aphrodite; Euripides’
Hippolytus; Plato’s Symposium; selections from Aristotelians; selections from Hellenistic philosophers; and
St. Paul’s First Corinthians. It highlights both crucial differences between Greek and Christian worldviews, as well as those
features of the former that made the latter possible.
D2S1, D2S2
The Morality of Trade: An Intellectual History
Eric Daniels
Throughout Western history philosophers have debated the morality of trade, laying the foundation for
people’s evaluation of capitalism. Commerce in all its forms—from exchanges of goods in a marketplace to complex derivative contracts—is
central to the moral status of capitalism. As Ayn Rand observed, the moral evaluation of commerce predated capitalism’s development—and
has been used to damn it ever since.
This course surveys the intellectual history of trade, illustrating how a legacy of suspicion and
hostility led capitalism’s pseudo-defenders to abdicate the moral case for capitalism. Capitalism’s pseudo-defenders embraced utilitarian
arguments about efficient social outcomes to avoid confronting the moral condemnation of trade. Only Ayn Rand provided the proper answer
in her rousing defense of trade and the trader principle as the essence of morality. By highlighting Ayn Rand’s unique defense, the course
shows how the justification for trade is its morality, not merely its consequence.
D3S1, D3S2
Making Poetry Part of Your Life
Lisa VanDamme
Thanks to Ayn Rand, we understand the purpose of art and have experienced it profoundly
in her novels. But beyond her novels, many don’t know where to turn for literary spiritual fuel. And few turn to one of
its richest sources: poetry. Because of the failure of American education, many regard poetry as remote, erudite and
inaccessible.
The goal of this course is to help people make poetry part of their lives. To
demonstrate its power to give eloquent voice to their every mood, experience and conviction. To show that the world of
poetry is a lavish treasure house of artistic inspiration.
The focus is not on the history, the forms or the internal structure of poetry—but
rather on why poetry has the power to enhance your life, and how to harness that power.
D4S1, D4S2
Reformation and Religious Wars (1517–1648)
A Lesson in Faith and Force
Andrew Lewis
The Renaissance was interrupted by a reactionary religious movement—the Reformation—which
attempted to return Europe to Dark Age asceticism and mysticism.
Martin Luther ignited the Reformation, but he was neither the first nor the only thinker
to propose reforming the Catholic Church. This course examines why and how Luther succeeded where others had “failed.” It
compares the Protestant Reformation in Germany—essentially a religious phenomenon—with the Anglican Reformation—a political
one. Together, these schisms broke the Catholic Church’s hold on Europe and unleashed centuries of religious war.
Covering events from 1517 to 1648, this course traces the Reformation from its scholastic
roots, through the story of Martin Luther, to the bloodshed that followed. It examines the practical consequences of
religious conflict, the lasting effects of these disputes and the inevitability of force among the faithful. (This course
continues Mr. Lewis’s series on European history; prior courses are not a prerequisite.)
Register now!
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