Where Ayn Rand Learned a Lot of Philosophy I just came across a very interesting tidbit. According to Leonard Peikoff in a podcast, Ayn Rand got a lot of her notions of philosophy from a text he used when he was in college. He claimed she read the thing cover to cover. The podcast: Is It Necessary To Read Kant In Order To Denounce Him? btw - He says the requirement is different (I think he means something like common sense requirement). He says reading Rand is a breeze and reading Kant is excruciating, so if you get a fair overview of Kant's thinking, that works. He claims when he was you