Founder David Kelley | Founded 1990 | |
 | ||
Similar Ayn Rand Institute, Atlas Network, Cato Institute, Young Americans for Liberty, Ludwig von Mises Institute | ||
The Atlas Society (TAS), formerly known as the Institute for Objectivist Studies and then as The Objectivist Center, is an American Objectivist research and advocacy organization that "promotes open Objectivism: the philosophy of reason, individualism, achievement, and freedom originated by Ayn Rand". It is part of the Objectivist movement that split off from the Ayn Rand Institute in 1990 due to disagreements over whether Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism was a "closed system" or an "open system".
Contents
History
TAS was founded by philosopher David Kelley as the Institute for Objectivist Studies in 1990. It was renamed The Objectivist Center in 1999. That same year, the Center founded "The Atlas Society" as an interest group targeted at people who read Rand's novels but were not familiar with other Objectivist literature. On June 5, 2006, the organization announced its decision "to use The Atlas Society as our official name, which will help us promote our ideas to Rand readers as well as to the general public, while reserving The Objectivist Center name for our more academic and scholarly activities".
The Society continues to host conferences, including an annual Atlas Summit, conduct scholarly research and student training, issue pamphlets, recordings, op-eds, and monographs and provide speakers to the media and campus groups.
Views
Kelley espouses Objectivism as an open system, hence the organization has advocated what he terms "a policy of tolerant, open debate and free discussion" at its forums. It has also been willing to cooperate with certain libertarians on joint projects, and to carry works by individuals such as Nathaniel Branden, with whom Rand broke in the late 1960s.