Synopsis
A collection arguing that rational self-interest is the proper basis of ethics and that altruism is morally corrosive.
Core passage idea
Paraphrase · Modern copyrighted workEach person should live for their own sake, neither sacrificing themselves to others nor others to themselves, with reason as their moral guide.
It inverts conventional morality by treating self-interest as virtue, grounding a politics of individual rights and limited government.
To avoid a bubble
Pair with Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics.
Reading note
Read the title essay and Rand's pieces for the argument; the tone is polemical and absolute by design.
Best paired with
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics