The Atlas Society Presents - Objectively Speaking

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250

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Aug 2026

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About the show

We promote open Objectivism: the philosophy of reason, achievement, individualism, and freedom. Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism was set forth in such works as her epic novel Atlas Shrugged, and in her brilliant non-fiction essays. Objectivism is designed as a guide to life, and celebrates the remarkable potential and power of the individual. Objectivism also challenges the doctrines of irrationalism, self-sacrifice, brute force, and collectivism that have brought centuries of chaos and misery into the lives of millions of individuals. It provides fascinating insights into the world of politics, art, education, foreign policy, science, and more, rewarding you with a rich understanding of how ideas shape your world. Those who discover Objectivism often describe the experience as life-changing and liberating. Ayn Rand's philosophical works have been praised as presenting historic breakthroughs in thinking. At the Atlas Society, our scholars work to further develop this philosophy born in the mid-twentieth century. We present the empowering principles of Objectivism to a global audience, and offer those principles as a rational and moral alternative in the marketplace of philosophical ideas.

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60 recent

August 12, 202657 min

America at 250: Reflecting on 1776 with Timothy Sandefur

Join Atlas Society CEO Jennifer Grossman for the 315th episode of Objectively speaking where she sits down with four-time returning guest Timothy Sandefur to talk about his latest book "Proclaiming Liberty: John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and the Declaration of Independence," which revisits the revolutionary year of 1776 through the minds of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, two men whose words and ideas gave birth to modern liberty. Returning for a fourth time on Objectively Speaking, Sandefur is no stranger to The Atlas Society, having joined us previously to discuss his books "Frederick Douglass: Self-Made Man," "Freedom’s Furies: How Isabel Patterson, Rose Wilder Lane, and Ayn Rand Found Liberty in an Age of Darkness," and "Proclaiming Liberty: John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and the Declaration of Independence," Sandefur is the Vice President for Legal Affairs at the Goldwater Institute and holds the Duncan Chair in Constitutional Government. He is the author of ten books as well as more than 50 scholarly articles on a wide variety of legal subjects.

August 5, 202645 min

Did The New Deal Prolong The Depression? with Amity Shlaes

Join Atlas Society CEO Jennifer Grossman for the 314th episode of Objectively Speaking as she sits down with Amity Shlaes, chair of the Calvin Coolidge Presidential Foundation, to discuss her book "New Deal Rebels: An Anthology of Critics of the New Deal," which gathers the voices of economists, journalists, and businessmen who warned—in real time—that FDR's policies were deepening and extending the very crisis they claimed to solve. Shlaes is one of America's foremost historians of the New Deal era. In addition to The Forgotten Man, a #1 New York Times bestseller also adapted as a graphic novel, she is the author of Coolidge, Great Society, and The Greedy Hand: How Taxes Drive Americans Crazy and What to Do About It.

July 29, 202658 min

Steve Jobs: The Untold Chapter with Geoffrey Cain

Join Atlas Society CEO Jennifer Grossman for the 313th episode of Objectively Speaking as she sits down with returning guest Geoffrey Cain to talk about his new book “Steve Jobs in Exile: The Untold Story of NeXT and the Remaking of an American Visionary,” which draws on previously unpublished materials and new interviews to reveal the untold story of Steve Jobs's “lost decade”—the twelve years of failure, near-bankruptcy, and humiliation at NeXT that forged the discipline and vision behind his legendary return to Apple. An award-winning investigative journalist, Cain is a returning guest to Objectively Speaking, having previously joined us to discuss “The Perfect Police State: An Undercover Odyssey into China's Terrifying Surveillance Dystopia of the Future.” A former correspondent at The Economist and regular commentator in The Wall Street Journal, Time, Foreign Policy, and a frequent guest on CNN, NPR, Fox News, and Bloomberg, Cain sits down with world leaders, tech founders, and dissidents at pivotal moments in history. His previous books also include “Samsung Rising,” longlisted for the Financial Times and McKinsey Business Book of the Year.

July 22, 20261 hr 3 min

Alan Greenspan: From Rand to Bland with Richard Salsman

Join Atlas Society Senior Scholar Richard Salsman, Ph.D., for the 312th episode of Objectively Speaking as he unpacks the paradox at the heart of Greenspan's career: how a man shaped by Ayn Rand's philosophy of reason and free markets came to spend two decades running the very institution designed to plan them.

July 15, 202657 min

The "Founder" Spirit that Fuels, with Arthur Herman

What makes a true founder, and why does America keep needing them to break the cycle of stagnation? Join Atlas Society CEO Jennifer Grossman for the 306th episode of Objectively Speaking, where she sits down with returning guest Arther Herman to talk about his latest book, "Founder’s Fire: From 1776 to the Age of Trump." In "Founder’s Fire: From 1776 to the Age of Trump," Arthur Herman argues that America has always been driven forward by a distinctive type of leader—the founder—who, through visionary risk-taking and a willingness to build from first principles, has repeatedly rescued the nation from stagnation. Returning for a second time on Objectively Speaking, Herman previously joined to discuss his book "The Cave and the Light: Plato Versus Aristotle, and the Struggle for the Soul of Western Civilization." A senior research fellow at the Civitas Institute, Herman is a Pulitzer Prize Finalist historian and biographer, authoring nine books, including the New York Times bestseller "How the Scots Invented the Modern World," "Freedom’s Forge: How American Business Produced Victory in World War II," and "1917: Lenin, Wilson, and the Birth of the New World Disorder."

July 8, 202654 min

When Competence Becomes Countercultural with Doug Casey

Join Atlas Society CEO Jennifer Grossman for the 310th episode of Objectively Speaking as she sits down with returning guest Doug Casey to talk about his latest co-authored book, "The Preparation: How To Become Competent, Confident, and Dangerous," which lays out a four-year, sixteen-cycle alternative to a college path that now averages $140,000 and too often delivers ideology, debt, and obsolete credentials. What if you could trade four stagnant years in lecture halls for four years of adventure, emerging as a debt-free EMT, pilot, welder, web/app builder, rancher, and entrepreneur all in one? A previous guest on Objectively Speaking, Doug Casey returns to discuss The Preparation: How To Become Competent, Confident, and Dangerous, his new book co-authored with entrepreneur Matt Smith and Matt's twenty-year-old son Maxim, the program's "beta tester." Written across three generations, it lays out a four-year, sixteen-cycle alternative to a college path that now averages $140,000 and too often delivers ideology, debt, and obsolete credentials. Built on a foundation of Stoic and Renaissance thinking, The Preparation is a roadmap for forging the kind of person who can protect, build, heal, sell, and lead—a modern-day Renaissance Man ready for a world being upended by AI and economic turmoil.

July 1, 20261 hr 0 min

When Empathy Becomes Suicidal with Gad Saad

Join Atlas Society CEO Jennifer Grossman for the 309th episode of Objectively Speaking as she sits down with returning guest Gad Saad to discuss his book, Suicidal Empathy: Dying to Be Kind, and its blistering critique of maladaptively irrational altruism that has gripped our culture. Building on themes from his earlier work on the spread of destructive ideas, Saad argues that a miscalibrated sense of empathy is driving many of today’s most dangerous cultural and policy failures. A Lebanese-Canadian Professor of Marketing, Saad is a scholar at the Declaration of Independence Center for the Study of American Freedom at the University of Mississippi. Gad Saad previously joined The Atlas Society to discuss his book, The Parasitic Mind: How Infectious Ideas Are Killing Common Sense, which examines how certain destructive ideas have managed to take hold in places like academia and popular culture.

June 25, 202635 min

Why Do Jews Lean Left? with Batya Ungar-Sargon

Join Atlas Society CEO Jennifer Grossman for the 308th episode of Objectively Speaking, where she is joined by returning guest Batya Ungar-Sargon for a conversation about her latest book, "The Jews and the Left," which examines how one of the most consequential alliances in American political life—between Jews and the progressive movement—has come undone, and what its unraveling reveals about antisemitism on the left. Returning for a second time on Objectively Speaking, Batya previously joined to discuss her books, "Second Class: How the Elites Betrayed America's Working Men and Women" and "Bad News: How Woke Media Is Undermining Democracy." Host of "Batya!" on NewsNation, she holds a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, and has written for outlets like the New York Times, the Washington Post, Foreign Policy, Newsweek, and the New York Review of Books Daily.

June 17, 202658 min

Taking Tariffs to Court, with Sara Albrecht

Join Atlas Society CEO Jennifer Grossman for the 307th episode of Objectively Speaking, where she sits down with the Chairman of the Liberty Justice Center, Sara Albrecht, to talk about the organization's recent legal victory over the Trump Administration’s tariffs before the U.S. Supreme Court. Can the President unilaterally impose sweeping taxes on Americans without Congress's approval—and what does it take to stop him when he tries? In February 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court answered with a resounding "no," issuing a landmark 6-3 ruling in Trump v. V.O.S. Selections that struck down the Trump Administration's "Liberation Day" tariffs and reaffirmed that the power to tax belongs to Congress, not the executive. Sara Albrecht is Chairman of the Liberty Justice Center, the nonprofit, public-interest law firm that brought V.O.S. Selections, Inc. v. Trump and prevailed at every level of the federal judiciary, from the U.S. Court of International Trade to the Supreme Court. Beyond her work at Liberty Justice Center, Sara serves on the boards of the Illinois Policy Institute, Empower Illinois, the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, Unify America, and the Harris Theater for Music and Dance.

June 11, 202655 min

What's Driving the "Horseshoe of Nihilism"? with Gregg Hurwitz

Join Atlas Society CEO Jennifer Grossman for the 306th episode of Objectively Speaking as she sits down with by New York Times #1 bestselling author Gregg Hurwitz to discuss the real-world rise of political violence, radicalization, and what he calls the "horseshoe of nihilism": the point where the far left and far right bend toward each other and meet in a shared rejection of meaning, a "No Lives Matter" zone. What's driving the "horseshoe of nihilism," and why are so many people being pulled toward it? Fresh off his standout appearance at The Atlas Society's Galt's Gulch 2026 student conference, Hurwitz unpacks how monetized algorithms select for users most vulnerable to radicalization, why so many people, especially young men, feel unmoored from reality, and how much responsibility each of us bears for where our attention goes. The author of 27 thrillers, including the bestselling “Orphan X” series and upcoming novella “The Delivery”, Hurwitz has been published in 33 languages and currently serves as Co-President of International Thriller Writers. Beyond fiction, he's written screenplays and television scripts for many of the major studios and networks, published poetry, and is an award-winning documentary producer.

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