We assume that good-looking people are smarter and more effective than they really are, and that homely people are the reverse.

Intellectual-property rules are clearly necessary to spur innovation: if every invention could be stolen, or every new drug immediately copied, few people would invest in innovation. But too much protection can strangle competition and can limit what economists call 'incremental innovation' - innovations that build, in some way, on others.

Pop music thrives on repetition. You know a song's a hit when you've heard it so often that you'll be happy never to hear it again.

On the simplest level, telecommuting makes it harder for people to have the kinds of informal interactions that are crucial to the way knowledge moves through an organization. The role that hallway chat plays in driving new ideas has become a cliche of business writing, but that doesn't make it less true.

There does seem to be some evidence that as people get older, they procrastinate less, perhaps because they feel the pressure of time more.

A long-term crisis, after a certain point, no longer seems like a crisis. It seems like the way things are.

Breaking tasks down into smaller sub-tasks can be very useful.