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Thanks for the suggestions. I'm starting with the hunchback of Notre Dame.

So I've noticed that Objectivism has changed my life for the better during the few months since when I got into it. Always pursuing my rational self-interest has been very beneficial for me from many points of view. Socially speaking, I've made a lot more friends and became more confident. There's one aspect I can't seem to be able to get around though. How do I act in a subtly competitive social scenario? For example, when you're with your buddies and some hot girls are around and all of you wanna be that manly dominant guy who bosses the others around. Or generally speaking when you compete with others in a subtle way for being the most alpha person in that situation. I say 'subtle' because you're not really in a position of adversity towards the other people so you can't start a fight, you just gotta know what attitude to have and kinda talk your way to the top. I already appear to be an outgoing person, but I want to be the 'leader', as cheesy as that may sound. So what's the way to do that and what would Objectivism have to say about the mental state you should adopt in these situations?

Benjamin Franklin wanted to achieve moral perfection so he wrote in a journal and marked in his journal everytime he violated one of his virtues... I believe this is one of the reasons he achieved such great success. I want to do something similar but with the Objectivist virtues and instead of using a journal I will be using Habitica.com. I need more examples of instances in which I can mark when I have practiced a virtue and instances I can mark when I have violated a virtue... Can you think of anymore? Here is the list I have so far: Productivity/Purposefulness Doing items on my to-do list Going to work Going to work on time Violations of Productivity/Purposefulness Spending more than 30 minutes pottering around when I have better things to do Not working on a project for more than 3 days in a row because it didn't excite me as much as it did at the beginning. Honesty Telling the truth when it's hard Violations of Honesty Lying Justice Listening to people who deserve it Apologizing when I have done someone wrong in some way Disagreeing with someone who disparages views that I agree with Violations of Justice Remaining silent when someone disparages my views Independence Paying my bills Looking at my bank account Violations of independence Buying something I can't afford __________________________________________ I can't think of any unique example for rationality and integrity, since rationality and integrity encompasses every example I just listed. Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated!

There is an interesting quote from Peikoff, 1991: Ayn Rand regarded her theory of concepts as proved, but not as completed. There are, she thought, important similarities between concepts and mathematics still to be identified; and there is much to be learned about man’s mind by a proper study of man’s brain and nervous system. In her last years, Miss Rand was interested in following up on these ideas—in relating the field of conceptualization to two others: higher mathematics and neurology. Her ultimate goal was to integrate in one theory the branch of philosophy that studies man’s cognitive faculty with the science that reveals its essential method and the science that studies its physical organs. This is pretty much the current program of today's field, Cognitive Science. It's also important to realize that Rand developed her ideas at a time when linguistic analysis in philosophy and behaviorism in psychology were dominate. But the science behind the operation of sense organs, childhood development, etc. played a large role in helping her to develop the ideas in ITOE. Rand also says of Aesthetics: The esthetic principles which apply to all art, regardless of an individual artist’s philosophy, and which must guide an objective evaluation . . . are defined by the science of esthetics—a task at which modern philosophy has failed dismally. A "science of aesthetics" would be every bit as comprehensive as the "science of epistemology " as developed in the ITOE. She considers epistemology to be a science (and she's not just using the term "science" metaphorically): Epistemology is a science devoted to the discovery of the proper methods of acquiring and validating knowledge. There would also be a significant overlap and interdependency between the sciences of epistemology and aesthetics - they are not mutually exclusive.