Objectivist Conference 2003 - July 5th to July 17th

Faculty

ALAN AUGUST
Alan August performs regularly as a soloist in opera, oratorio, musical theatre and song. He was a principal with Santa Barbara Grand Opera for five seasons, and with Long Beach Opera in Marriage of Figaro and the rare Paisiello Barber of Seville. He was winner of KUSC’s search for “L.A.’s Greatest Unknown Tenor” in ’92. He trained privately and at USC and UCLA opera workshops, and at the American Institute of Musical Studies, in Graz, Austria. He has created numerous roles in original musicals. He has also acted in Shakespeare, contemporary theatre, TV and film.

ANDREW BERNSTEIN
Ph.D., Philosophy, 1986; City University of New York.
Andrew Bernstein holds a Ph.D. in philosophy and is a member of the Ayn Rand Institute’s Speakers Bureau. He is working on a book, The Capitalist Manifesto: The Historic, Economic and Philosophic Case for Laissez-Faire.

YARON BROOK
Ph.D., Finance, 1994; University of Texas at Austin.
Dr. Brook is the executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute. For seven years he was a professor of finance at Santa Clara University. Dr. Brook was a cofounder of Lyceum International and is a managing partner and founder of BH Equity Research. Dr. Brook has published in academic as well as popular publications, taught and lectured extensively in the United States and abroad on issues related to the Mid-East conflict, terrorism and American foreign policy, finance and ethics, international finance, banking and corporate governance. Dr. Brook has been interviewed extensively by the print, radio and television media on current events, including the Mid-East conflict, terrorism, environmentalism, animal “rights,” the energy crisis and religion. Among his recent interviews have been appearances on CNN’s Talk Back Live, Fox News Channel’s Your World with Neil Cavuto and The O’Reilly Factor.

PAT CORVINI
Ph.D., Electrical Engineering, 1995; University of California, Santa Barbara.
Dr. Corvini is an optoelectronics engineer working in Silicon Valley. She has a longstanding interest in the history of science, and first fell in love with Archimedes as a senior in high school.

ERIC DANIELS
Ph.D., American History, 2001; University of Wisconsin.
Dr. Daniels is visiting assistant professor of history at Duke University’s Program on Values and Ethics in the Marketplace. He has lectured at summer conferences and to numerous Objectivist community groups. He is an alumnus of ARI’s Objectivist Graduate Center. He contributed five articles to the recently published Oxford Companion to United States History, and is currently working on a book about American politics and ethics in the antebellum period.

BO DRAGSDAHL
M.A., Philosophy, expected 2003; University of Copenhagen.
Mr. Dragsdahl is a graduate student of philosophy at University of Copenhagen. He has taught undergraduate classes in history of philosophy and philosophy of science and has been a student at the Objectivist Graduate Center since 1998. His lecture course “Thomas
Aquinas: Paving the Way for the Renaissance” was presented at the Summer 2002 East Coast Conference.

DANIEL DRAKE
M.A., Philosophy, 1993; Claremont Graduate University.
Mr. Drake teaches philosophy at Harper College and the College of Lake County, in Illinois. He has given courses at Objectivist conferences on the Industrial Revolution and the philosophy of economics. He has also taught philosophy at California State University at Dominguez Hills and at San Bernardino. He received a B.A. in philosophy and economics from Northwestern University and has attended the Objectivist Graduate Center.

STUART MARK FELDMAN
M.A., Art, 1975, Rowan University, NJ.
Mr. Feldman is a professor of figure modeling and anatomy at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia. He studied at the Frudakis Academy in Philadelphia and was an apprentice to the renowned sculptor and educator Dr. Boris Blai (a student of the French sculptor Rodin). He has created a number of commissioned sculptures, including a fountain sculpture consisting of eight, life-size bronze figures for Reservoir Park in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

ROBERT GARMONG
Ph.D., Philosophy, 2002; University of Texas.
Robert Garmong received his B.A. in political science and economics from the University of Chicago and his Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Texas. He is also a graduate of the Objectivist Graduate Center. His first book, “J.S. Mill’s Re-Conceptualization of Liberty,”
is currently under submission to publishers. He is now working on his second book: “The
Concept of Liberty: Locke, Mill, Rawls and Rand.”

TED & MARILYN GREY
Marilyn and Ted Gray met through ballroom dancing at an Objectivist conference. They continue to dance as a hobby, taking weekly lessons. They have taught lessons to small groups of friends at home and at many conferences. In the last few years they have entered competitive dancing, winning firsts in fox-trot, waltz, tango, swing, cha-cha, rumba and bolero. Their success is a result of loving to move their bodies in time to music and of hearing and interpreting the music in the same way.

DAVID HARRIMAN
B.S. in physics; U.C. Berkeley, 1979; M.S. in physics, University of Maryland, 1982; M.A. in philosophy, Claremont Graduate School, 1995.
Mr. Harriman has worked as a physicist for the U.S. Department of Defense and taught philosophy at California State University at San Bernardino. He is the editor of Journals of Ayn Rand. He has lectured on the scientific revolution, the concept of "space," and the influence of Kantian philosophy on modern physics. He is currently writing a book, "The Anti-Copernican Revolution and the Fall of Physics."

ELLEN KENNER
Ph.D., Clinical Psychology, 1992; University of Rhode Island.
Dr. Kenner is a licensed clinical psychologist. She has taught courses at the University of Rhode Island and at Rhode Island College in Introductory Psychology, Abnormal Psychology and Theories of Personality. She gives talks on a wide variety of psychological topics including romance, communication skills, self-improvement and parenting skills. Dr. Kenner is in her seventh year as host of the nationally syndicated radio talk show, The Rational Basis of Happiness®.

JOHN LEWIS
Ph.D., Classics, 2001; University of Cambridge.
Dr. John Lewis is assistant professor of history at Ashland University, and is holder of the Anthem Fellowship for the Study of Objectivism. He has published in the journals Polis, Dike, Bryn Mawr Classical Review, Anglo-Hellenic Review, and Roundtable: A Journal of the University of Chicago School of Law, as well as The Intellectual Activist and Capitalism Magazine.

EDWIN A. LOCKE
Dr. Edwin A. Locke is Dean’s Professor of Leadership and Motivation (Emeritus) at the R.H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland, College Park. He is internationally known for his research and writings on work motivation, leadership and related topics, including the application of Objectivism to psychology and management. He is a senior writer for the Ayn Rand Institute and has published numerous op-eds.

ROBERT MAYHEW
Dr. Mayhew is associate professor of philosophy at Seton Hall University. He is the author of Aristotle's Criticism of Plato's Republic, and editor of Ayn Rand's Marginalia and of Ayn Rand's Art of Nonfiction. He has recently completed a book on Ayn Rand's HUAC testimony, and another on Aristotle's biology. He is currently editing a collection of essays on Ayn Rand's We the Living.

SHOSHANA MILGRAM
Ph.D., Comparative Literature, 1978; Stanford University
As associate professor of English at Virginia Tech, Dr. Milgram teaches detective fiction, comparative literature, film and science fiction, in addition to the usual period and genre courses. She has taught Ayn Rand’s writings in a variety of graduate and undergraduate courses, and has presented talks on Ayn Rand at national meetings of the leading academic organizations in literature and at the Smithsonian Institution. Her publications include articles on Ayn Rand, Victor Hugo and Fyodor Dostoevsky.

AMY PEIKOFF
B.S. Math/Applied Science 1992, University of California Los Angeles
J.D., 1998, UCLA School of Law
Mrs. Peikoff is a graduate student at the University of Southern California, where she is completing a dissertation in the area of philosophy of law. An occasional writer of editorials for ARI, she has taught introductory logic courses at the University of Southern California, at Mount St. Mary’s College in Los Angeles and at ARI’s Objectivist Academic Center. She has also written for The Intellectual Activist and has lectured for Objectivist organizations and conferences in California and Texas.

LEONARD PEIKOFF
Ph.D., Philosophy, 1964; New York University
Dr. Peikoff, Ayn Rand's associate for over 30 years and her legal and intellectual heir, is the leading Objectivist philosopher. He is the author of Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand, the first systematic presentation of Ayn Rand's philosophy, and of The Ominous Parallels. Dr. Peikoff taught philosophy at New York University, Hunter College, the University of Denver, and the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn. He is currently at work with David Harriman on a new book, "Induction in Physics and Philosophy."

Leonard Peikoff's appearance at this conference does not imply that he agrees with the ideas or formulations of any other speakers.

JOHN RIDPATH
Ph.D., Economics, 1974; University of Virginia.
Dr. Ridpath, retired associate professor of economics and Intellectual History at York University in Toronto, Canada, writes and speaks on the history of ideas and their impact on social change. He has spoken at conferences about the central thinkers in Western history and the impact of their ideas on history, including the ideas influencing the Founding Fathers and early American history. Widely recognized for his lecturing skills, as well as for his public speaking and debating in defense of capitalism, he is a recipient of the prestigious award given by the Ontario Council of University Faculty Associations for outstanding contribution to university teaching.

GREG SALMIERI
B.A., Philosophy, 2001, The College of New Jersey.
Mr. Salmieri is a graduate student in philosophy at the University of Pittsburgh, and has taken courses at the Objectivist Academic Center. His research interests are focused on Aristotle’s epistemology and methodology. Among other projects, he is working on an article about the
methodology Aristotle uses to define virtues of character in his Nicomachean Ethics.

RICHARD SALSMAN
M.B.A., Monetary Economics, New York University, 1988
Richard M. Salsman is president and chief market strategist of InterMarket Forecasting, which provides quantitative research and forecasts of stocks, bonds and currencies to guide the asset allocation decisions of institutional investment managers, mutual funds and pension plans. He is the author of numerous books and articles on economics, banking and forecasting from a free-market perspective, including Breaking the Banks: Central Banking Problems and Free Banking Solutions (American Institute for Economic Research, 1990) and Gold and Liberty (American Institute for Economic Research, 1995). Mr. Salsman’s work has appeared in The Intellectual Activist, the New York Times, Investor’s Business Daily, The Wall Street Journal, Forbes and Barron’s. From 1993 to 1999 he was a senior vice president and senior economist at H. C. Wainwright & Co. Economics. Prior to that he was a banker at Citibank and the Bank of New York. Mr. Salsman is an adjunct fellow at the American Institute for Economic Research and the founder of The Association of Objectivist Businessmen.

THOMAS SHOEBOTHAM
M.M., Cello Performance, 1992; Eastman School of Music.
M.M., Orchestral Conducting, 1996; University of New Mexico.
Mr. Shoebotham is Chorus Master of Opera San Jose and Assistant Conductor of the Peninsula Symphony in San Mateo, California. He has conducted numerous performances for Berkeley Opera, as well as for many other opera companies and orchestras. He has taught Kodaly music education in several schools and performed recitals on cello and on piano in New York, Illinois, New Mexico, Nevada, and California over the last 20 years.

STEPHEN SIEK
Ph.D., Musicology, 1991; University of Cincinnati
Dr. Siek is Professor of Music at Wittenberg University. He has extensive concert experience, including performances at New York's Lincoln Center and in London. A widely published musical scholar, he is a contributor to The Revised New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, the standard English-language musical encyclopedia. He has recorded The Philadelphia Sonatas of Alexander Reinagle (c.1750-1809) for the Titanic label, and he is currently completing a disc devoted to the music of Robert Schumann. He is also at work on a forthcoming biography of British piano teacher Tobias Matthay (1858-1945).

MARY ANN SURES
M.A. , Art History, 1966; Hunter College.
Mrs. Sures taught art history at New York University and Hunter College. Her philosophical approach to art history is presented in her article on sculpture, "Metaphysics in Marble" (The Objectivist, Feb.-Mar., 1969). She is co-author with her late husband, Charles, of Facets of Ayn Rand (published by the Ayn Rand Institute), memoirs of their longtime friendship with Ayn Rand and her husband, Frank O'Connor.

ROBERT W. TRACINSKI
Robert W. Tracinski is editor and publisher of The Intellectual Activist, a monthly magazine analyzing political and cultural events from an Objectivist perspective. He received his undergraduate degree in philosophy from the University of Chicago and studied with the Objectivist Graduate Center. He now teaches undergraduate-level writing courses for the Ayn Rand Institute's Objectivist Academic Center and is editorial director of ARI's op-ed program.

LISA VANDAMME
B.A., Philosophy, 1994; University of Texas at Austin
Lisa VanDamme is the owner and director of VanDamme Academy, a private elementary and junior high school in Laguna Hills, California. Her curriculum and teaching method are described in her two previous lectures: "Reclaiming Education: A Home-Schooling Alternative" and "The Role of Hierarchy in Education."

DARRYL WRIGHT
Ph.D., Philosophy, 1991; University of Michigan
Dr. Wright is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Harvey Mudd College in Claremont, California. His main teaching and research interests are in moral and political philosophy. He has lectured for the Objectivist Academic Center and at numerous Objectivist conferences.

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