IQ² live debates - past events
2009 series
Below are past events from the 2009 IQ² series.
You can also visit the future events page to see what's coming up. Details of debates from the 2008 series are also available, including recordings of each debate.
We should legalise euthanasia
3 February 2009
Some people suffer terrible deaths – riven by uncontrollable pain, denied the dignity of choice, willing but unable to end life without the aid of others. Yet deliberately to end a human life is, for many, always wrong.
Watch this debate on The Sydney Morning Herald website.
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Freedom of expression must include the licence to offend
31 March 2009
Most people believe in freedom of expression – up to a point. But what of the artist who offends our ideas of innocence? Or the politician who stokes the flames of racial hatred? Or the cleric who preaches that all other faiths are false?
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It's time to get rid of state government
26 May 2009
They may frustrate, they may infuriate. However, for many, the States remain the indispensable building blocks of Federation. But have the States outlived their usefulness – becoming expensive islands of dysfunction?
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Public funding of private education is unconscionable
25 June 2009
The parents of students attending private schools pay taxes. So, why should their children be denied a share of the education dollar? Where should we invest public funds – and according to what set of principles might we decide without prompting envy and division?
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The media cannot be trusted TO TELL the truth
4 August 2009
Newspapers, radio, television and now the internet are the means by which countless millions engage with information about the world in which we live. There are critical moments in our lives when the truth really matters. Can the media be trusted at these moments? Are commercial imperatives overwhelming considerations of public interest?
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Our current immigration rate is too high
15 September 2009
It used to be that only xenophobes and economic nationalists opposed increased immigration. Today, caution is being urged by environmentalists. Could Australia increase its population while reducing its footprint? Can our society cope with the pace of change that increasing numbers of immigrants will force?
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Intelligence Squared should shove off to Melbourne where it belongs
26 October 2009
Sydney’s IQ² debates are not going anywhere. However, this brute fact has done nothing to dampen a body of Southern opinion that refuses to believe that something as intelligent as IQ² could have taken root in Sydney! A light and irreverent end to the 2009 Season.
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2008 series
View details of the events from the 2008 series of debates.
