About Dr. Peikoff

Leonard Peikoff is a philosopher, author, teacher, and the world’s foremost educator on Ayn Rand’s philosophy, Objectivism. Throughout his career, Dr. Peikoff has coupled his gifts of communication with his experience as Rand’s friend and student to illuminate her ideas to students the world over.

Born in Winnipeg, Canada in 1933, Dr. Peikoff’s life was changed when, at the age of 17, he met author Ayn Rand (as recounted in his lecture “My Thirty Years With Ayn Rand: An Intellectual Memoir”). Rand kindled in Peikoff a passion for ideas, and he soon turned from his pre-medical studies to pursue a career in philosophy, entering New York University and eventually completing his PhD there in 1964.

Dr. Peikoff became and remained a close associate and friend of Ayn Rand until her death. He was privy to early drafts of Rand’s 1957 novel Atlas Shrugged and involved in discussions that contributed to her philosophical work Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, made widely available in 1979. He soon began lecturing to Rand’s growing number of admirers, delivering such popular lectures and courses as The History of Philosophy (1970 and 1972). And, across countless hours of discussions with Rand, he became the world’s foremost educator on her philosophy, delivering the only authorized presentation of Rand’s ideas, his 1976 course The Philosophy of Objectivism.

Upon Ayn Rand’s death in 1982, Dr. Peikoff became her legal heir and the executor of her estate. Earlier that year he published his first book, The Ominous Parallels, hailed by Rand as “clear, tight, disciplined, beautifully structured, and brilliantly reasoned.” In 1991, he published Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand, a systematic, hierarchical presentation of Rand’s philosophy, based on his 1976 course on the subject. Peikoff’s next major work, 2012’s The DIM Hypothesis, identifies three methods of mental integration and shows how they have shaped the world we live in.

Following Rand’s death, Dr. Peikoff continued her tradition of speaking annually at Boston’s Ford Hall Forum series of free public lectures. These, along with dozens of other lectures and courses delivered by Dr. Peikoff over the course of his career, can be found on this site. In addition to teaching, speaking, and writing, Dr. Peikoff has tried his hand at podcasting and hosting his own radio show, the latter of which he recollects here. Throughout these many accomplishments and educational activities, the passion for ideas ignited decades ago by Ayn Rand has remained apparent.