Douglas B. Rasmussen

Douglas B. RASMUSSEN

Interviewed in
April 1996

Dr. Douglas B. Rasmussen is Professor of Philosophy at St. John's University in New York City. He received his Ph.D. from Marquette University in 1980, and his B.A. from the University of Iowa in 1971. He has co-edited The Philosophic Thought of Ayn Rand (University of Illinois Press, 1984) and Liberty for the Twenty-First Century (Roman & Littlefield, 1995). He has co-authored The Catholic Bishops and the Economy: A Debate (Social Philosophy and Policy Center and Transaction Books, 1987); Liberty and Nature: An Aristotelian Defense of Liberal Order (Open Court, 1991); and Liberalism Defended: The Challenge of Post-Modernity (Edward Elgar, 1996). He has published over sixty articles and reviews dealing with issues in epistemology, philosophy of language, ethics, and political philosophy in various professional journals and books.

He has been a Bradley Scholar at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, DC and has received research fellowships from the Center for Libertarian Studies, the Institute for Humane Studies, the Reason Foundation, and the Earhart Foundation. He also has been a recipient of a summer seminar fellowship from the National Endowment to the Humanities and has received merit awards from St. John's University. He was awarded by St. John's University a medal for Outstanding Faculty Achievement in 1994. He is recently appointed Program Coordinator of the Master of Arts in Liberal Studies at St. John's University.

Dr. Rasmussen is a member of the American Philosophical Association and has presented and commented on session papers. He also is a member of the American Catholic Philosophical Association and has twice received the Matchette Award for the outstanding paper by a younger scholar at the ACPA annual meeting. He is a member of the Metaphysical Society of America and the American Association for the Philosophic Study of Society. He is a founding member of the Ayn Rand Society which meets with the APA.

Dr. Rasmussen is married. His wife, Caroline, is a clinical perfusionist at Winthrop University Hospital in Mineola, Long Island. He likes to travel and golf.