morality

Archive for Tag “morality”

Roe v. Wade: Forty Years Later [podcast episode #01]

Sunday, January 20, 2013 by

On January 22, 1973, the United States Supreme Court handed down the decision on the landmark case of Roe v. Wade. With a 7-to-2 majority vote, the court struck down state bans on abortion, prompting a national debate that continues forty years later.

That decision — as well the subject of abortion itself — remains divisive. Activists on both sides debate whether and to what extent abortion should be legal, how the Supreme Court shapes the law on issues of constitutionality, and the role of morality and religious views in the political sphere.

On this episode of Eye to Eye, ARI’s new podcast, hosts Jordan McGillis and Amanda Maxham sit down with Dr. Onkar Ghate, ARI’s senior fellow, and Tom Bowden, legal analyst, to discuss the political, legal and moral questions surrounding abortion.

Some of the topics covered include:

  • Ayn Rand’s view on abortion and the Roe v. Wade ruling
  • The legal basis for the Roe v. Wade decision
  • The state-level attempts to undermine Roe v. Wade
  • Abortion and individual rights
  • The labels “pro-life” and “pro-choice”
  • “Personhood” amendments
  • Ayn Rand’s view on the nature of sex
  • Health care, abortion, and contraception
  • Abortion and the Tea Party movement
  • The separation of church and state
  • The morality of abortion
  • Objective legal interpretation
  • The future of the Roe v. Wade decision

Podcast: Play in new window

Listen to or download this episode (Duration: 44:16 — 20.3MB)

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Posted in Culture, Government & Policy, Podcast

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Basu in The Daily Caller: It’s time to unplug Medicare’s third rail

Monday, November 26, 2012 by

Over at The Daily Caller, my colleague Rituparna Basu writes:

This election Paul Ryan and other Republicans dared approach the third rail that is Medicare, and Democrats upped the voltage, branding Republicans every chance they got as wanting to “end Medicare as we know it.”

But whatever you thought of Ryan’s particular proposals for Medicare, and whoever you voted for, there’s one thing we must all come to agree on now—it is high time we unplug the third rail.

The whole article is here.

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Posted in Business & Economics, Government & Policy

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New Forbes.com Column: What We Owe Steve Jobs

Thursday, October 6, 2011 by

Forbes.com has published the latest column by Yaron Brook and me, “What We Owe Steve Jobs.”

Watching the world mourn Steve Jobs, we are reminded of how massive crowds of Americans used to gather to celebrate the launch of a new bridge or a new railroad. There is a widespread recognition that Jobs was a creative genius who changed our world profoundly and for the better. Even President Obama, not usually given to praising businessmen, said that Jobs “transformed our lives, redefined entire industries, and achieved one of the rarest feats in human history: he changed the way each of us sees the world.”

All of this raises an important and to-date unasked question: what do we owe Jobs and productive geniuses like him?

You can read the entire column here.

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Posted in ARI/ARC news, Business & Economics

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The “Ayn Rand vs. Jesus Christ” Campaign

Tuesday, July 5, 2011 by

Over at the American Thinker, Dr. Harry Binswanger, a member of the Ayn Rand Institute’s Board of Directors, writes:

The American Values Network, a left-wing group, with considerable funding by George Soros, has launched a media blitz under the banner “Ayn Rand vs. Jesus Christ.”  As an Institute founded by Ayn Rand’s heir and devoted to advancing her philosophy, Objectivism, we would like to respond.  Since this is an issue Rand faced repeatedly in her lifetime, our response is basically to let her speak for herself.

Read the whole thing here.

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FoxNews.com: Does America Need Ayn Rand or Jesus?

Wednesday, June 29, 2011 by

ARC senior fellow Dr. Onkar Ghate has an editorial on FoxNews.com today. “Ayn Rand is everywhere,” he writes, and “her political opponents are growing nervous.” With some Tea Partiers and politicians praising Ayn Rand’s views, what “worries advocates of the welfare state is that they have never before faced any moral opposition.”

Whatever the rhetoric of Republicans and Democrats in the past, they agreed on the basic goal: more and more government controls are necessary to rein in businessmen, “manage” the economy, and minister to those in need.

No matter which party was in power, therefore, we got things like Sarbanes-Oxley, bailouts of GM and Citibank, a huge prescription drug “benefit” and ObamaCare. Politics was a squabble about the efficacy of any proposed controls, not a dispute about the morality or immorality of imposing controls in the first place. As Krugman observes, in years past everyone “accepted the legitimacy of the welfare state.”

But now its advocates sense that this is no longer true, that some Americans are beginning to question the moral legitimacy of the welfare state. To strangle this questioning in the crib, supporters of government controls are trying to persuade their opponents to abandon Rand.

The current tactic is to tell Tea Partiers and “conservatives” that if you take religion seriously, you can’t be a fan of the atheist Ayn Rand. . . .

Dr. Ghate notes that “this much is true. Rand’s moral teachings are fundamentally different from Jesus’ teachings.”  But he goes on to ask the question, “Did Jefferson and the other Founding Fathers not reject the Sermon’s advice in creating America?”

Read the rest of the op-ed here.

Image: Wikimedia commons

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Posted in Ayn Rand, Culture, Government & Policy

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Debate on the Morality of Capitalism Tonight

Monday, May 2, 2011 by

Former chairman and CEO of BB&T Corporation John Allison will debate Washington Post columnist Ezra Klein tonight in New York City.  The topic is “Capitalism: Is It Moral?”  This debate is the third event of the three-part “First Principles” debate series co-sponsored by the Ayn Rand Center, the think tank Demos, and WNYC, the local NPR affiliate.

On WNYC’s site, Mr. Allison has written a blog post describing the nature of capitalism and his experience as a commercial banker for thirty years. Mr. Allison writes:

But capitalism is not exploitative. I spent nearly twenty years as the CEO of one of America’s largest financial institutions, BB&T, and one of the things I saw again and again was that a businessman who abandons principle and tries to make money at the expense of others, although he may succeed in the short run, is doomed in the long run. Taking advantage of people is not truly selfish, it is self-defeating: people will not trust you. You might fool Fred and Suzie, but they will tell Tom, Dick, and Harry and no one will trust you. Being untrustworthy will put you out of business.

The reason BB&T has been so successful is because we help our clients achieve economic success and financial security. They voluntarily pay us for this service, allowing us to make a profit. Both BB&T and our customers are better off from this win-win relationship. On a free market, where you can’t seek favors or bailouts from Washington, business is about creating these types of win-win relationships–by figuring out ways to benefit your clients while making a profit doing so. (And, if you do defraud your customers or engage in some other crime, the government in a free market is there to put a stop to it.)

Read the rest of John Allison’s post here.

Tonight’s debate can be watched live via ARC’s Facebook page starting at 6 p.m. ET.  And if you missed the last two debates, check them out on our YouTube page.

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Posted in ARI/ARC news, Business & Economics

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Interview with Co-Editor of Why Businessmen Need Philosophy

Wednesday, April 20, 2011 by

The April issue of the Ayn Rand Institute’s monthly newsletter Impact features an interview with Debi Ghate, co-editor of the new collection Why Businessmen Need Philosophy.

Impact: Hello, Ms. Ghate. Thank you for meeting with Impact to talk about the new edition of Why Businessmen Need Philosophy. To begin, why did you decide to revise and expand this book?

Debi Ghate: Thanks for speaking with me! The idea to update Why Businessmen Need Philosophy arose when my co-editor, Richard Ralston, learned that the first edition had sold out. He was interested in printing it again with a few updates. When I learned of this, it seemed like a tremendous opportunity for us to create a new volume that might be of more interest to the academic and business community. It brought to mind all the positive conversations we’ve had about Atlas Shrugged with businessmen, college students and educators interested in free market ideas. We personally meet or otherwise hear of many fans of the novel who say the book was influential on them–and many of them are (or will someday be) in business-related fields.

Yet very few consider themselves to be seriously interested in philosophical ideas, which of course, the novel is full of. The new edition of Why Businessmen Need Philosophy serves as a bridge between the novel and its underlying ideas with an emphasis on how they apply to the realm of business. Hence the subtitle for our new book–The Capitalist’s Guide to the Ideas Behind Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged.”

When Richard compiled the first edition in 1999, Objectivist scholarship in this area (and in many other areas) was more limited. Since then, there has been an explosion of excellent articles on themes of interest to the audiences I’ve described. In addition, the new volume provided us with an opportunity to highlight Ayn Rand’s writings on business in a way that had not been done before.

The result is that we now have a much expanded, improved and timely book than was originally planned.

Read the rest of the interview here.  The issue also includes an excerpt from ARC senior fellow Onkar Ghate’s essay ”Atlas Shrugged: America’s Second Declaration of Independence.”

For another excerpt from the book and the full table of contents, check out the website for Why Businessmen Need Philosophy.

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Why Businessmen Need Philosophy Hits Stores April 5!

Monday, April 4, 2011 by

The revised and updated edition of Why Businessmen Need Philosophy hits stores this Tuesday, April 5!  This edition contains new essays by ARC writers Onkar Ghate, Alex Epstein, Yaron Brook, and Keith Lockitch.  Check out the website for the book, where you can peruse the table of contents, watch an interview with co-editor Debi Ghate, read an excerpt from the book, and keep up with other updates.

Don’t forget to place your order for Why Businessmen Need Philosophy today!

And if you want to be entered into a drawing to win a free copy of the book, take our survey.

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Why Businessmen Need Philosophy to be released April 5

Thursday, March 17, 2011 by

The revised and updated edition of Why Businessmen Needs Philosophy will be released April 5, 2011. This collection explores why businessmen are vilified in the culture today and how they should defend themselves against the plethora of attacks made against them. The book contains several new essays written by ARC intellectuals, including Yaron Brook, Alex Epstein, and Keith Lockitch.

Check out this excerpt of an interview with co-editor Debi Ghate.

You can peruse the table of contents here, and pre-order a copy of Why Businessmen Need Philosophy today!

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Posted in Business & Economics

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Demos vs. ARC debate, round two

Wednesday, March 9, 2011 by

WNYC has posted round two in the online debate between Yaron Brook of ARC and Miles Rapoport of Demos, on the proper role of government. That online exchange is a prelude to a live debate Thursday night on the same topic at NYU’s Skirball Center, kicking off the First Principles Debate Series.

For those who cannot make it to the Skirball Center, note that there will be a live video stream from the event.

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Posted in ARI/ARC news, Government & Policy

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