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In 1851, the United Kingdom astounded the world with the Great Exhibition—an iconic showcase of innovation, industry, and cultural exchange. Dr Anton Howes of The Entrepreneurs Network has made a case showing how, in the 21st century, a modern-day Great Exhibition has the potential to reaffirm Britain's commitment to new technology and solidify its position as a global leader. By hosting such an event, the UK can harness its strengths, inspire innovation, attract investment, and foster international collaboration.A modern Great Exhibition would serve as a catalyst for innovation, igniting the imaginations of entrepreneurs, scientists, and inventors from across the globe. By providing a platform for showcasing cutting-edge technologies and ideas, the UK can inspire a new wave of innovation and creativity. This exhibition could highlight the country's expertise in areas such as artificial intelligence, biotechnology, renewable energy, and advanced manufacturing, encouraging breakthroughs and fostering collaboration between academia, industry, and startups.Hosting a Great Exhibition would enable the UK to position itself as a global leader in new technology. By featuring groundbreaking inventions, research, and development, the UK can demonstrate its commitment to pushing the boundaries of progress. This exhibition could emphasize the UK's prowess in emerging fields, allowing the world to witness firsthand the nation's capacity to embrace technological advancements and drive positive change. As The Entrepreneurs Network puts it:"Visitors would see drone deliveries in action, take rides in driverless cars, actually use the latest in virtual reality technology, play with prototype augmented reality devices, and see organ tissue and metals and electronics being 3D-printed in front of them. They would see industrial manufacturing robots in action, have a taste of lab-grown meat at the food stalls, meet cloned animals brought back from extinction, and themselves perform feats of extraordinary strength wearing the exoskeletons that are already in use in factories and warehouses. Visitors would naturally get to meet the inventors and scientists and engineers who developed it all, too. They would browse the latest in fashion, art, and architecture, seeing them alongside historical examples. And the whole thing would be powered using only the cutting edge of clean energy technology, much like how the great new Corliss Engine drove the 1876 Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia, or how Westinghouse's alternating current powered the 1893 Chicago World's Fair. Visitors might also be able to view air CO2 removal machines in action."A modern Great Exhibition would be a magnet for international investors seeking opportunities in the UK's vibrant technology sector. By showcasing the country's commitment to innovation, the exhibition would demonstrate the potential for lucrative partnerships and investments. It would attract the attention of venture capitalists, industry leaders, and entrepreneurs, fostering economic growth and creating job opportunities. Additionally, by highlighting the UK's thriving research institutions and vibrant startup ecosystem, the exhibition could draw global talent, promoting knowledge transfer and enriching the nation's pool of skilled professionals.A Great Exhibition would provide a unique platform for international collaboration, fostering partnerships between the UK and nations around the world. By inviting countries to showcase their technological advancements, the exhibition would encourage knowledge exchange, cross-cultural learning, and collaboration on global challenges. This shared experience could create lasting networks and partnerships, promoting diplomacy and cooperation across borders.Hosting a Great Exhibition would generate a sense of national pride and confidence in the UK's capabilities. It would remind the world of the nation's rich history of technological progress and innovation, while also signaling a bold vision for the future. By celebrating its achievements, the UK can inspire a renewed sense of purpose and confidence in its ability to shape a prosperous and sustainable future.There is no doubt that a modern Great Exhibition holds immense potential for the United Kingdom. By showcasing its commitment to new technology, the UK can stimulate innovation, attract investment and talent, foster international collaboration, and boost national pride. This exhibition would serve as a testament to the nation's determination to embrace progress, shaping a future where innovation and technological advancement drive economic growth and societal well-being. The time has come for the UK to once again captivate the world's attention by hosting a Great Exhibition that reaffirms its status as a global leader at the forefront of the technological frontier.

Eight years ago in 2015, I published "Britain and the World in 2050," setting out my predictions for the world ahead of us. It was widely covered in the media, with journalists going to town on the recreated woolly mammoths and dinosaurs, not revived from mosquitos preserved in amber, but by back breeding and genetic manipulation of flightless birds.Some also picked up and covered my remarkable prediction that the cost of energy would have dropped dramatically by 2050. I wrote:"Energy costs will by 2050 be a fraction of their present-day costs. For most consumer uses, energy will be effectively free."The cost of energy has witnessed several spikes since then, and is now more expensive than it was. Partly this is down to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, with some contribution made by a go-green agenda that shuns the cheaper sources in favour of more expensive ones. Nonetheless, I remain convinced that my prediction will come about. The fossil fuel we'll still be using will be gas, but nuclear will take a larger share, particularly with the new small reactors coming on line. Solar will be making a major contribution, as ways are found to increase the efficiency of photo-voltaic cells by combining ultra-thin surfaces on the silicon.There are several new technologies that could be game changers. There are vast reserves of natural hydrogen beneath the Earth's surface, more than previously supposed, and more accessible. The US Geological Survey concluded in April that there is probably enough accessible hydrogen in the earth's subsurface to meet total global demand for "hundreds of years". Currently, the effort to extract it commercially resembles the early days of fracking, with 'wildcatters' setting the pace. It portends cheap and clean generation of electricity, bypassing fossil fuels and emitting no greenhouse gases.Another possible technology involves the use of thin layers of materials flecked with nanoholes. The pores are essentially small enough (100nm) that the molecule's electrical charge can pass through them and be harvested to generate electricity. Water molecules pass through, generating a charge imbalance that produces harvestable electricity plucked not from thin air, but from naturally moist air.The device is called an Air-gen and can operate at all times despite the weather conditions because moisture is always in the air. When scaled up, it offers low-cost, clean electricity.A newer technology from scientists at the University of Rochester uses semiconductor nanocrystals for light absorbers and catalysts and bacteria to donate electrons to the system. The system is submerged in water and driven by light. Bacteria interact with nanoparticle catalysts to make hydrogen gas more cheaply than can be achieved by electrolysis. It is not that any of these might necessarily be the magic bullet that gives us cheap, clean energy. It is that some of them, in combination with yet more ingenious ways still to be developed, will give us the energy we need at a price we will be prepared to pay. And that price will be very low. We won't use less energy; we'll just produce it more cleverly.

A welcome new initiative is the newly-formed "Growth Commission" that will analyze policy suggestions to assess their likely long-term impact on the UK's GDP. This is useful because all too often policies are proposed without consideration of whether they will adversely affect the UK's ability to grow its economy. Instead of cost-benefit analysis being performed, there is a tendency to consider only the benefits the new policy might bring, without looking at the costs it could impose.The new Growth Commission aims to fill that gap, drawing on the work of more than a dozen expert economists. There was a similar, but not identical, initiative under the Presidency of George H Bush, and headed from the White House by his Vice-President, Dan Quayle. It was called the Council on Competitiveness, and its mission was to study every new initiative emerging from Congress and the bureaucracy, and to assess its likely impact on American competitiveness. Well-meaning and possibly worthwhile initiatives would be set forward without any thought to the costs they might impose on American business, or how less competitive they might make it. The Vice-President's Council on Competitiveness changed that because the initiatives would have to be examined before they could proceed, and changes were made and amendments inserted to lessen the impact on competitiveness that initiatives might otherwise make.It met with strong criticism on with the American Left, largely because it kicked many of their costly proposals into the long grass. Some called it "the roach motel of congressional legislation." This was because a popular series of TV ads at the time featured a box called a roach motel into which cockroaches were attracted by the scent, but once inside were killed by the poison. The voice of Muhammad Ali accompanied the ads saying, "They check in, but they don't check out." The same fate was alleged to happen to Congressional initiatives.One difference is that the Growth commission will look at likely effects on growth, not just on competitiveness, although there is overlap. The big difference is that the Quayle Commission had real powers emanating from the Vice-President's office. The Growth Commission is independent and outside of government and has no similar powers. While it is an immensely useful body to oversee what Departments and the bureaucracy are doing, it might be more effective if it were allowed to operate from within Downing Street, with direct access and input to decision makers.

Benjamin Franklin famously said, "In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes." Unfortunately, in the UK they arrive simultaneously in the form of what is called "Inheritance Tax," but is in fact a Death Tax.  There is a moral case and an economic case for abolishing the Death Tax (IHT). Both are valid.  The moral case is that people have already paid tax on their income and capital gains during their lifetime. To tax those assets again is double taxation, akin to taxing people who buy spirits VAT on the excise duty they have paid.One of the strongest human motives is the love for our children and the desire to improve their lot in life. We want the freedom to pass on to them the saving we've accrued in our own lives so that theirs might be better, and we want to do so without the state seizing a large part of that wealth before it reaches them.Abolishing the Death Tax will incentivize investment and economic growth. When individuals know that their assets will be subject to significant taxation upon their death, they are less inclined to accumulate wealth or invest in long-term ventures. Removing this tax burden could thus encourage entrepreneurship, risk-taking, and investment, leading to economic expansion and job creation.The UK tax system, including the Death Tax, can be complex and burdensome to navigate. It is estimated that IHT accounts for 10 percent of the tax code, while generating only 0.2 percent of revenues. Abolishing it would simplify the system and reduce administrative costs for individuals and families. The time and resources currently spent on estate planning and tax avoidance strategies could be redirected to more productive activities, benefiting the economy as a whole.Abolishing the tax will help reduce tax avoidance and evasion. Wealthy individuals often employ complex legal structures or transfer assets to offshore entities to mitigate their exposure to IHT. Its abolition would reduce the incentive to engage in these practices, leading to a more transparent and fairer tax system overall.The Death Tax puts a significant burden on family businesses and assets, potentially leading to their liquidation or breakup to meet tax obligations. Abolishing the tax could help preserve intergenerational businesses and assets, allowing families to continue their legacies without the fear of hefty tax bills.It is likely that abolishing the tax could incentivize charitable giving. When individuals are not burdened by the prospect of a significant tax liability on their estates, they may be more ready to donate to charitable causes.Given all of this, it is not surprising that IHT is reckoned to be the least popular tax levied in the UK. The Adam Smith Institute has been publishing papers against it for decades, and it now senses a rising tide of hostility to it. The time is long overdue for the Death Tax to be quietly put down and given a decent burial.

The nominally Conservative UK government in the UK is talking to the supermarket owners with a view to seeing prices of essential foodstuffs being capped.We have price caps on energy, and there is talk of rent controls such as exist in Dublin and Stockholm. There are many bad ideas in economics, but price caps must rank as one of the worst.In 1978 my colleague, Dr Eamonn Butler, co-authored a book entitled "Forty Centuries of Wage and Price Controls."  It chronicled 4000 years of attempts to cap wages and prices, from Hammurabi in ancient Babylon to the attempts by Edward Heath in the UK and Richard Nixon in the US to fix wages and prices. The one consistent feature is that all of them fail. They fail because prices are a signal that changes behaviour. If something is in short supply, a price rise encourages people to use less of it. It also encourages producers to bring more of it onto the market. A price cap prevents that signal from being sent, and does not encourage less consumption and more production. A price cap on energy does not persuade people to use less of it or for producers to search for more of it. A price cap on rents guarantees a shortage of rental properties. It tells landlords that they can make better returns on their capital elsewhere, and to take their properties off the market.Prices signal the interaction of supply and demand. They tell us what is happening in the economy. To set that artificially is to lose that information and the behavioural changes that it engenders. It is akin to trying to control the temperature in the room by blocking up the thermostat. You stop the signal, not the reality that it should be measuring.It is part of the sad reality of broken Britain that we are looking to policies that we know from experience simply do not work and never have.

In the 1970s, as the country's post-war love affair with socialism began to sour, a new type of think tank opened its doors in Britain. Spearheading a rejection of state planning and controls, the Adam Smith Institute helped to put incentives and enterprise firmly back into the political mainstream. Its influence was extraordinary, even revolutionary. Britain's new passwords became opportunity, aspiration and the free market. With no backing and no resources save their own conviction, a handful of motivated individuals managed to play a role in transforming the prospects of a nation. This is t

Intro -- Contents -- About The Author -- Acknowledgements -- Introduction: Everyday Economics -- 1. Trading Things, Creating Wealth -- 2. What Things Are Worth, And When -- 3. Prices, Selling And Buying -- 4. Producing And Distrubuting -- 5. Enterprise -- 6. Money And Currency -- 7. Banks and Finance -- 8. Competition, Monopolies, And Setting The Rules -- 9. Taxes -- 10. International Trade -- 11. Globalistation And Devlopment -- 12. Overview -- Glossary -- Index.

THIS PAPER DESCRIBES THE IMPACT OF THE 1979 THATCHER PROGRAM FOR PRIVATIZATION OF THE BRITISH PUBLIC SECTOR, AND SHOWS THAT THE GRADUAL APPROACH HAS ACCOUNTED FOR ITS SUCCESS. THE AUTHOR BELIEVES THAT PRIVATIZATION IS HERE TO STAY, AND THAT THE POLICY OF PRIVATIZATION HAS LED TO THE BUILDUP OF GROUPS WITH A VESTED INTEREST IN THE NEW ORDER WHO WILL OPPOSE ANY ATTEMPT TO REVERSE IT.

Intro -- Contents -- Preface -- Thales -- Anaximander -- Pythagoras -- Xenophanes -- Heraclitus -- Parmenides -- Anaxagoras -- Empedocles -- Protagoras -- Zeno -- Diogenes -- Socrates -- Democritus -- Antisthenes -- Plato -- Aristotle -- Epicurus -- Aristarchus -- Archimedes -- Seneca -- Epictetus -- Ptolemy -- Marcus Aurelius -- Sextus Empiricus -- Plotinus -- Saint Augustine of Hippo -- St Anselm -- Roger Bacon -- Thomas Aquinas -- William of Occam (Ockham) -- Francesco Petrarch -- Desiderius Erasmus -- Niccolo Machiavelli -- Galileo Galilei -- Thomas Hobbes -- René Descartes -- Blaise Pascal -- John Locke -- Benedict de Spinoza -- Isaac Newton -- Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz -- Giambattista Vico -- Bernard Mandeville -- Bishop (George) Berkeley -- Charles, Baron de Montesquieu -- Voltaire (FranÃois-Marie Arouet) -- Benjamin Franklin -- David Hume -- Jean-Jacques Rousseau -- Denis Diderot -- Adam Ferguson -- Adam Smith -- Immanuel Kant -- Edmund Burke -- Thomas Jefferson -- Johann Herder -- Jeremy Bentham -- Wilhelm Hegel -- Arthur Schopenhauer -- Mary Shelley -- Auguste Comte -- Frédéric Bastiat -- Ludwig Feuerbach -- John Stuart Mill -- Harriet Taylor Mill -- Charles Darwin -- Pierre-Joseph Proudhon -- Søren Kierkegaard -- Mikhail Bakunin -- Karl Marx -- Herbert Spencer -- Charles Peirce -- William James -- Friedrich Nietzsche -- John Dewey -- Edmund Husserl -- Max Weber -- Bertrand Russell -- G. E. Moore -- Pierre Teilhard de Chardin -- Erwin Schrödinger -- Martin Heidegger -- Ludwig Wittgenstein -- Herbert Marcuse -- Friedrich Hayek -- Gilbert Ryle -- Michael Oakeshott -- Karl Popper -- Arthur Koestler -- Ayn Rand -- Jean-Paul Sartre -- Hannah Arendt -- H. L. A. Hart -- Isaiah Berlin -- A. J. Ayer -- John Rawls -- Thomas Kuhn -- Michel Foucault -- Noam Chomsky -- Jacques Derrida -- Robert Nozick -- A–Z of Entries -- A -- B -- C -- D