Ayn Rand

In this course

Rand appears primarily as a formative intellectual influence on Peter Thiel's libertarian worldview and his conception of technological entrepreneurship as a quasi-heroic, individualist enterprise. The readings invoke Rand indirectly through Thiel's rhetoric of "founders" as exceptional figures operating outside conventional constraints, a framing that enables the course to examine how Silicon Valley ideology draws on mid-century capitalist philosophy to justify concentrated power in tech. Her presence here is more as a philosophical genealogy than a direct object of analysis—she matters insofar as understanding Thiel's vision of disruption requires recognizing its Randian roots.

Mentioned in 1 reading