[Physicist]

The "reason" Randites use is derived from John Locke's thoroughly discredited theories of a tabula rasa and "natural rights". There is a whole new science of evolutionary psychology being developed which has remarkable powers to explain and predict a wide variety of social institutions.

You're confusing the question of "how it got there" with "how it works". Evolution might tell me how we came to respect each other's rights, but it cannot tell us the moral principle of why we should do so.

The one area where I seriously part with the Objectivists is in the interpretation of quantum mechanics. It's especially maddening because the basic epistemological premise of Objectivism--the independent existence of reality--is correct, but often gets lost in quantum philosophizing.