Contributors

Ari Armstrong

Ari Armstrong publishes FreeColorado.com, co-authors a column for the Free Press of Grand Junction, Colorado, and contributes articles about regional issues to other publications. He is the author of Values of Harry Potter: Lessons for Muggles, a book exploring the heroic fight for life-promoting values in the Potter novels. He is currently working on a book critical of religion, and he writes about religion-related issues at AriArmstrong.com.

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Andrew Bernstein

Andrew Bernstein holds a PhD in philosophy from the graduate school of the City University of New York. His book The Capitalist Manifesto: The Historic, Economic, and Philosophic Case for Laissez-Faire was published in 2005 by University Press of America. His forthcoming book Objectivism in One Lesson: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Ayn Rand will be published in 2008 by Hamilton Books.

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Craig Biddle

Craig Biddle is the editor and publisher of The Objective Standard and the author of Loving Life: The Morality of Self-Interest and the Facts that Support It. He is currently writing a book on the principles of rational thinking and the fallacies that are violations of those principles. In addition to writing, he lectures and teaches workshops on ethical and epistemological issues from an Objectivist perspective. He maintains a website at www.craigbiddle.com.

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Tore Boeckmann

Tore Boeckmann’s mystery short stories have been published and anthologized in several languages. He is the editor of Ayn Rand’s The Art of Fiction and has lectured on literary esthetics and current affairs in Europe and America. His recent publications include “The Fountainhead as a Romantic Novel” and “What Might Be and Ought to Be: Aristotle’s Poetics and The Fountainhead” in Essays on Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead, as well as “Anthem as a Psychological Fantasy” in Essays on Ayn Rand’s Anthem (both collections edited by Robert Mayhew).

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Thomas A. Bowden

Thomas A. Bowden (JD, University of Maryland, 1987) is an analyst at the Ayn Rand Center for Individual Rights in Washington, D.C., focusing on legal issues. His op-eds have appeared in The Wall Street Journal and dozens of other publications, and he frequently provides commentary to various media outlets. A former law school instructor, he practiced civil litigation in Baltimore for twenty years. His lectures on Oliver Wendell Holmes: Destroyer of American Law are available through the Ayn Rand Bookstore. His book, The Enemies of Christopher Columbus, is a critique of multiculturalism. He also contributes regularly to Voices for Reason.

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Yaron Brook

Dr. Brook (PhD, finance, 1994, University of Texas at Austin) is president and executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute and a contributing editor to The Objective Standard. He lectures on Ayn Rand’s philosophy of Objectivism, business ethics, and foreign policy at colleges, community groups, and corporations throughout the world. His articles have appeared in academic business journals, popular newspapers, and magazines. His numerous media appearances include interviews on Closing Bell (CNBC) and The O’Reilly Factor (Fox News Channel). As an entrepreneur, Dr. Brook co-founded the venture-capital consulting firm BH Equity Research in San Jose, California. And as an award-winning professor, he taught finance at Santa Clara University before joining ARI.

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Interview

Stella Daily

Stella Daily is a copywriter at a pharmaceutical advertising agency, where she specializes in oncology drugs. She is also a prolific crossword constructor, with published puzzles in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and many other major markets. She holds a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from Princeton University, and she writes about healthcare issues at her blog, ReasonPharm.

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Eric Daniels

Dr. Eric Daniels (PhD, University of Wisconsin, 2001) is a research assistant professor at Clemson University's Institute for the Study of Capitalism. He lectures on American intellectual, business, legal, and political history to audiences at colleges and community groups around the country. He recently coauthored the U.S. Economic Freedom Index. His other publications include a chapter in The Abolition of Antitrust and five entries in The Oxford Companion to United States History. Daniels has appeared on C-SPAN and Voice of America radio, and his op-eds have been published in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and the San Diego Business Journal.

Articles & Reviews

Dianne Durante

Dianne Durante (PhD, University of Cincinnati) is the author of Outdoor Monuments of Manhattan: A Historical Guide (New York University Press) and Forgotten Delights: The Producers, A Selection of Manhattan's Outdoor Sculptures , both of which include substantial discussions of the nature of art and of esthetic analysis and evaluation. She is a freelance writer, lecturer, and exhibition designer, and maintains www.ForgottenDelights.com, a website on art.

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Alex Epstein

Alex Epstein is an analyst at the Ayn Rand Institute, specializing in philosophy, business, and current affairs. His numerous op-ed pieces and essays have been featured in dozens of publications around the country, including the San Francisco Chronicle, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Miami Herald, and the Washington Times. Mr. Epstein holds a BA in philosophy from Duke University, where he served as editor and publisher of the Duke Review for two years.

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Michael Garrett

Michael Garrett, MD, practices emergency medicine in central Indiana. He received his BA from Ball State University and his MD from Indiana University School of Medicine. He completed a residency in Family Medicine at Ball Memorial Hospital.

Reviews

Alan Germani

Alan Germani is the associate editor of The Objective Standard.

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Gena Gorlin

Gena Gorlin graduated summa cum laude from Tufts University in 2008, earning a BS in psychology and philosophy. She currently works as a clinical interviewer and research assistant in the Massachusetts General Hospital psychiatry department, and intends to enter a PhD clinical psychology program in Fall of 2010. Since 2005 she has served as an editor and writer for The Undercurrent, a national campus publication. She is a two-time winner of the Ayn Rand Institute's Fountainhead Essay Contest and a graduate of the Institute's four-year academic program.

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David Harriman

Mr. Harriman is the editor of Journals of Ayn Rand and a senior writer for the Ayn Rand Institute. He has worked as a physicist for the U.S. Department of Defense and he has taught philosophy at California State University San Bernadino. He has lectured extensively on the history and philosophy of physics. He is currently writing two books: one demonstrating the influence of philosophy on modern physics (The Anti-Copernican Revolution), and another presenting Dr. Leonard Peikoff’s theory of induction (The Inductive Method in Physics).

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Diana Hsieh

Diana Hsieh is a graduate student in philosophy at the University of Colorado at Boulder, soon to be writing a dissertation on moral responsibility for beliefs and emotions. Her primary interests lie in ethics, particularly the history of ethics. She can be found online at her blog NoodleFood.

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Paul Hsieh

Paul Hsieh, MD, is a practicing diagnostic radiologist in the south Denver metro area. He received his BS in mathematics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and his MD from the University of Michigan, and has served on the faculty at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, MO. Dr. Hsieh is also a founding member of Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine (FIRM). For more information on FIRM, please visit www.WeStandFIRM.org.

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Monica Hughes

Monica Hughes is a mycologist and freelance writer with interests in agriculture. She holds a BS in biology from Houghton College and an MS and PhD in forest pathology and mycology from State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry (SUNY-ESF). She is the founder of Free Agriculture – Restore Markets (FA/RM), fa-rm.org.

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Elan Journo

Elan Journo is a junior fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute. His writing has appeared in, among other publications, Los Angeles Times, San Francisco Chronicle, ThePhiladelphia Inquirer, Houston Chronicle, The Globe and Mail of Canada, and Chicago Sun-Times.

Articles & Reviews

Joe Kroeger

Joe Kroeger holds a BS in physics and English literature from the University of North Carolina at Raleigh. His career has spanned the fields of electronics engineering, computer architecture, semiconductors, and publishing. He has written numerous technical articles for magazines and journals concerning the semiconductor and computer industries. He wrote and published The FileMaker Report newsletter from 1984 to 1995.

Reviews

Heike Larson

Heike Larson (MBA, University of Texas at Austin, 1995) is an independent sales and marketing consultant. Prior to her independent work, she was an executive-level sales and marketing representative with an aircraft manufacturer, and an Associate Principal at McKinsey & Company, an international consulting firm. She has written op-eds for the Ayn Rand Institute and articles for The Intellectual Activist.

Reviews

John David Lewis

Dr. Lewis is a visiting associate professor of political science at Duke University. He holds a PhD in classics from the University of Cambridge, has taught at the University of London. He has been a senior research scholar in history and classics at the Social Philosophy and Policy Center, Bowling Green State University, and a fellow of the Foundation for Objectivist Scholarship. He has published in journals such as Journal of Business Ethics, Social Philosophy and Policy, Polis, Dike, and Bryn Mawr Classical Review, and has lectured on classics, military history, and contemporary political issues at numerous universities and for private groups. His research interests are in ancient Greek and Roman thought, military history, and their connections to the modern day. His books are Solon the Thinker: Political Thought in Archaic Athens (Duckworth, 2006) and Early Greek Lawgivers (Bristol Classical Press, August, 2007). Dr. Lewis also writes for Capitalism Magazine.

Articles & Reviews

David Littel

David Littel holds a BA in philosophy from the College of William and Mary and a JD from the Washington and Lee University School of Law, where he was a contributing member of the Washington and Lee Law Review. He is a partner in the law firm of Taylor and Walker in Norfolk, Virginia. He litigates a variety of civil matters in State and Federal courts including professional malpractice, products liability, defamation and business disputes. Mr. Littel has conducted over one hundred jury trials and has argued cases before the Supreme Court of Virginia. His primary interests are in legal theory and legal history.

Articles & Reviews

Edwin A. Locke

Dr. Locke is dean’s professor of leadership and motivation emeritus at the R. H. Smith School of Business, University of Maryland. He is a fellow of the American Psychological Society, the American Psychological Association, and the Academy of Management. He is the recipient of the Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award (Society for I/O Psychology), the Career Achievement Award from the Academy of Management (OB Division), and the J. M. Cattell Award (APS). He, with Gary Latham, has spent the last forty years developing Goal Setting Theory, recently ranked No. 1 in importance among seventy-three management theories. He is internationally known for his research on motivation, job satisfaction, leadership, and other topics.

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Keith Lockitch

Dr. Lockitch is a resident fellow of the Ayn Rand Institute, where he writes and edits op-eds and teaches in the Institute’s Objectivist Academic Center. He teaches undergraduate writing and a graduate course on the history of physics. His writings have appeared in publications such as The Intellectual Activist, the Orange County Register and the San Francisco Chronicle. Dr. Lockitch received his undergraduate degree in physics from the University of British Columbia, and his PhD in physics from the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee. Prior to joining ARI in 2003, Dr. Lockitch was a postdoctoral researcher in physics at the University of Illinois and at Pennsylvania State University.

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Robert Mayhew

Robert Mayhew (PhD, Georgetown University, 1991) is professor of philosophy at Seton Hall University. He is the author of Aristotle’s Criticism of Plato’s Republic, The Female in Aristotle’s Biology, and Ayn Rand and Song of Russia, and the editor of Ayn Rand’s Marginalia, Ayn Rand’s The Art of Nonfiction, Essays on Ayn Rand’s We the Living , Essays on Ayn Rand’s Anthem, Ayn Rand Answers, and Essays on Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead. His latest book, on Plato’s Laws, is forthcoming from Oxford University Press in 2008. He is currently writing a book on the Sophist Prodicus of Ceos.

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John P. McCaskey

John P. McCaskey, Ph.D. in history, is the founder and chairman of the Anthem Foundation for Objectivist Scholarship. He spent twenty years in the computer business, most recently as founder of Epiphany, Inc., before returning to academia in 2001. He studies and teaches history and philosophy of science at Stanford University.

Reviews

Raymond C. Niles

Mr. Niles manages an investment fund focused on the electric utility and related industries. Prior to initiating his fund, Mr. Niles was a senior electric utility analyst at Citigroup and Schroders. He has appeared on numerous industry and media forums, including the Edison Electric Institute, the NYMEX, the Wall Street Journal, Barron’s, CNBC, and ABC News. Mr. Niles holds an MBA from the Stern School of Business at New York University.

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Amy Peikoff

Amy Peikoff (JD, UCLA, 1998; PhD, University of Southern California, 2003) is visiting fellow for the study of Objectivism in law and philosophy at Chapman University School of Law. She has published academic articles on the right to privacy, Searle’s theory of rational action, and aspects of Ayn Rand’s novels, as well as several opinion pieces.

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J. Brian Phillips

J. Brian Phillips owns a contracting company based in Houston, Texas. He helped defeat zoning ordinances in Houston in 1993 and in Hobbs, New Mexico in 2007, and has actively fought other violations of property rights on the local level. His articles on property rights and related issues have appeared in The Freeman, Kiwanis Magazine, the Houston Chronicle, and the Orange County Register. He blogs on property rights at txpropertyrights.blogspot.com.

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Richard M. Salsman

Richard Salsman is president of InterMarket Forecasting, Inc., an investment consulting firm. He was previously a senior economist at H.C. Wainwright Economics, Inc. (1993–1999) and a banker at Citibank and the Bank of New York (1981–1992). He has authored two books, Gold and Liberty (1995) and Breaking the Banks: Central Banking Problems and Free Banking Solutions (1990); and six chapters on such topics as banking crises, profit theory, antitrust law, the Great Depression, and environmentalism. His work has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, The Economist, the New York Times, Investor's Business Daily, Barron’s, Forbes,The Intellectual Activist, and Capitalism Magazine. He holds a BA in economics from Bowdoin College (1981) and an MA in economics from New York University (1988). 

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Larry Salzman

Larry Salzman is a property rights attorney residing in San Diego, California. In July, 2006, he began an extended leave of absence from litigation to manage projects at an ecommerce firm he co-founded in 2000. He was previously an attorney in the property rights section of Pacific Legal Foundation, where he represented parties against governmental agencies in litigation and as counsel for amicus curiae in both state and federal courts. Prior to joining PLF he was a judicial clerk at the United States Court of Federal claims. Mr. Salzman is a graduate of the University of San Diego School of Law, where he was assistant editor of the San Diego Law Review.

Articles & Reviews

Brian P. Simpson

Brian P. Simpson earned his PhD in economics from George Mason University. He is an associate professor and chair of the Department of Management and Marketing in the School of Business and Management at National University. Mr. Simpson has been published in peer-reviewed journals (including in the Journal of Business and Behavioral Sciences), made presentations at scholarly conferences (including the annual meeting of the Association of Private Enterprise Education), and created a minor in economics with a focus on free-market economics and Objectivist philosophy. He is the author of Markets Don’t Fail!

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Tara Smith

Tara Smith is professor of philosophy at the University of Texas at Austin, where she holds the BB&T Chair for the Study of Objectivism and is the Anthem Foundation Fellow. She is the author of Ayn Rand’s Normative Ethics: The Virtuous Egoist (2006), Viable Values: A Study of Life as the Root and Reward of Morality (2000),and Moral Rights and Political Freedom (1995),as well as numerous articles spanning such subjects as rights “conflicts,” everyday justice, forgiveness, friendship, pride, moral perfection, the nature of objectivity, and legal Originalism. Her current research centers around issues in the philosophy of law.

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C. Bradley Thompson

C. Bradley Thompson is the BB&T research professor at Clemson University and the executive director of the Clemson Institute for the Study of Capitalism. He has also been a visiting fellow at Princeton and Harvard universities and at the University of London. Professor Thompson is the author of the prize-winning book John Adams and the Spirit of Liberty. He has also edited The Revolutionary Writings of John Adams, Antislavery Political Writings, 1833–1860: A Reader and was an associate editor of the four-volume Encyclopedia of the Enlightenment. His current book project is on “The Ideological Origins of American Constitutionalism.”

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Lisa VanDamme

Ms. VanDamme (BA, philosophy, 1994, University of Texas at Austin) began her career in education when she was asked to develop a curriculum for a gifted child who was not being challenged in traditional schools. She created a program that emphasizes the core subjects, that allows students to progress to the limit of their ability, and that stresses the connection within and between subjects—and between school and life. After years of success as a homeschool teacher, she implemented her principles of education in the founding of VanDamme Academy, a private elementary and junior high school in Laguna Hills, California. At the school, Ms. VanDamme is presently responsible for administration, teacher training and curriculum supervision, and teaches grammar and literature to the junior high students. Ms. VanDamme’s theoretical work focuses on the application of Objectivism to educational theory.

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Gus Van Horn

Gus Van Horn is the pen name of C. Steven Miller Jr., a neuroscientist who resides in the Houston area. Dr. Miller received his BA in English literature and BS in mathematics from the University of Dallas, and his PhD in biochemistry and cell biology from Rice University. He regularly comments on political and cultural issues at http://gusvanhorn.blogspot.com.

Articles & Reviews

Daniel Wahl

Daniel Wahl is an independent investor and freelance writer on business and other topics. His writings can be read online at The Nearby Pen and The Guru 5.

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Don Watkins

Don Watkins is a writer and research specialist at the Ayn Rand Institute, and an editor of Impact, the Institute's donor newsletter. His op-eds have appeared in newspapers across the country. Mr. Watkins holds a BA in business administration from Strayer University.

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Lin Zinser

Lin Zinser was a civil litigator for nineteen years, defending businesses and individuals against tort and contract claims, many of which involved medical issues. She is the founder of both Ideas Matter, Inc. (a non-profit corporation dedicated to promoting discussion of and debate on crucial ethical and political issues) and Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine (FIRM), an Ideas Matter program dedicated to education and intellectual activism regarding the causes of and solutions to the current problems with health insurance and medicine. For more information on FIRM, please visit www.WeStandFIRM.org.

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