In NI Weekly, we gather together all the articles and videos published over the previous week. All you need to do is read the short summaries and decide what interests you. Here’s what we featured between September 26 and October 2. Enjoy!
An episode of ARI Bookshelf, our book review and discussion series, analyzes The Mattering Instinct by philosopher Rebecca Newberger Goldstein. Greg Salmieri, Ben Bayer, Mike Mazza and Sam Weaver discuss Goldstein’s account of why questions of meaning and purpose are so important in people’s lives, and her method of evaluating answers to such questions by how they help us fight “entropy.” They also correct the book’s brief but imprecise mention of Ayn Rand view of heroic people.
A short report on our recent student conference, AynRandCon-US, in Austin, Texas, surveys the program and spotlights feedback from students and faculty. Senior fellow and speaker Ben Bayer characterized the conference as “probably the most exciting student-oriented Objectivist conference I’ve attended.”
An article by Robertas Bakula defends the “Most Hated Company in America.” Bakula argues that the moral and economic accusations against Live Nation Entertainment about “gouging” concertgoers are smears that scapegoat a competent, successful company.
An interview with Greg Salmieri was featured on the Texas Talks podcast about Rand’s ideas and their relation to other philosophies and political movements. Among others, Salmieri discussed Aristotle, Marx, and “libertarians.” He also discussed his own work and interest in philosophy.
An article by Ben Bayer was published as the cover story for Free Inquiry, a secular magazine published by the Center for Inquiry, one of the leading atheist-agnostic organizations in the U.S. Bayer reviewed Bart Ehrman’s book Love Thy Stranger, which traces today’s dominant morality of self-sacrificial altruism to the teachings of Jesus. Bayer argues that Ehrman’s scholarship should cause skeptics of religion to doubt the rationality of altruism.