Sam Harris: Science can answer moral questions | Video on TED.com

"Questions of good and evil, right and wrong are commonly thought unanswerable by science. But Sam Harris argues that science can -- and should -- be an authority on moral issues, shaping human values and setting out what constitutes a good life."

Economic Efficiency

Bryan Caplan:

Economic efficiency is designed and well-suited to helping people who want the efficient outcome. It is equally true to say that economic efficiency is designed and well-suited to hurting people who don't want the efficient outcome.

Arts Funding: A new approach

David Rawcliffe:

Government support for the arts is currently provided as a subsidy to producers. This system suffers from four major problems: it relies on an expensive bureaucracy; it distributes subsidies unequally between regions and income groups; it distorts producers’ incentives through corruption, politicisation and arbitrary criteria; and it reduces competition, innovation and efficiency. This paper proposes a new system for arts funding: consumer-side subsidies delivered as vouchers to all citizens, which would alleviate the four problems outlined above, and better fulfil the central objectives of art funding.