Here is Ayn Randâs first non-fiction workâa challenge to the prevalent philosophical doctrines of our time and the âatmosphere of guilt, of panic, of despair, of boredom, and of all-pervasive evasionâ that they create.
As incisive and relevant today as it was sixty years ago, this book presents the essentials of Ayn Randâs philosophy âfor those who wish to acquire an integrated view of existence.â In the title essay, she offers an analysis of Western culture, discusses the causes of its progress, its decline, its present bankruptcy, and points the road to an intellectual renaissance.
One of the most controversial figures on the intellectual scene, Ayn Rand was the proponent of a moral philosophyâand ethic of rational self-interestâthat stands in sharp opposition to the ethics of altruism and self-sacrifice. The fundamentals of this moralityâ"a philosophy for living on Earth"âare here vibrantly set forth by the spokesman for a new class, For the New Intellectual.
