In 1969, Ayn Rand's Ford Hall Forum talk, 'Apollo and Dionysus,' addressed the near simultaneous events of Woodstock and the first lunar landing. Employing Greek mythology's god of the sun and god of wine, she compared the awe-inspiring accomplishments of NASA's Apollo space program to the famous three-day concert that has come to exemplify the counterculture of the 1960s and the "hippie era." Almost four decades later, Dr. Yaron Brook, President and Executive Director of the Ayn Rand Institute, reflects on her words and takes a new look at our society's drives toward individualism versus wholeness, light versus darkness, and civilization versus primal nature.
Yaron Brook serves as the executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute and the Ayn Rand Center of Individual Rights; ARI's Washington, DC-based public policy arm. He is a prominent advocate for Objectivism, the philosophy of novelist Ayn Rand. Dr. Brook is a contributing editor of *The Objective Standard*, contributing author to the anthology *Winning the Unwinnable War*, and co-author of *Neoconservatism: An Obituary for an Idea*. He is a weekly guest on *Front Page* hosted by PJTV, the first center-right online television network broadcasting over the Internet, and makes frequent guest appearances on national radio and TV with Objectivism's unique perspective on current events. A popular speaker at universities, public forums, industry conferences, academic panels, community and professional groups, his recent talks encompass the moral foundations of capitalism and individual rights--including the right to not be your brother's health care keeper.