So, there is a new good thing in the world.
Back in 1990, in the wake of the Peikoff-Kelley split and Truth and Toleration, David Kelley founded the Institute for Objectivist Studies as an alternative to the rigidly dogmatic Ayn Rand Institute. (I assume I don’t have to explain to readers of this blog what the Peikoff-Kelley split was or why Kelley’s side was right; but I’ll be happy to do so if anyone asks.)
The Institute for Objectivist Studies changed its name to “Objectivist Center” in 1999, and then – as its focus shifted from academics to popular advocacy – to “Atlas Society” in 2006. (Strictly speaking, both the Objectivist Center and the Atlas Society date from 1999, with the latter beginning as a special project of the former, and in 2006 the two simply switched roles like substance and property in the Furth-Gill model of elemental change. Yes, there will be a test on this later.)
Now in 2013 my old friends Irfan Khawaja and Carrie-Ann Biondi (who also edit Reason Papers), have started up, with Kelley’s blessing (but no official affiliation), a new, more academically oriented outfit with the old name of Institute for Objectivist Studies, to uphold the banner of responsible Rand scholarship against the forces of ARIanism. Website here; blog here.
Congratulations and good luck to Irfan and Carrie-Ann! I won’t wish confusion to their enemies, because that’s the problem already.