The Internet has been the most fundamental change during my lifetime and for hundreds of years. Someone the other day said, "It's the biggest thing since Gutenberg," and then someone else said "No, it's the biggest thing since the invention of writing."

John Marks Templeton has achieved exemplary success in both business and philanthropy. For Looking Forward he has assembled a diverse and remarkable group of experts in their fields-including the environment, medicine, the physical sciences, religion, the family, and international relations-and contributed two stellar pieces as well. Together these essays dispel fashionable pessimism and show how the world can progress-and is progressing-toward a better future.

Imagine if we succeed in inspiring our audiences to reduce their own impacts on climate change by just 1 percent. That would be like turning the state of California off for almost two months.

We've got to get rid of the fear of failure in this country. In America, people start things, fail and shake themselves down and start things again. The animal spirit of capitalism is stronger there.

Satellite broadcasting makes it possible for information-hungry residents of many closed societies to bypass state-controlled television channels.

In motivating people, you've got to engage their minds and their hearts. I motivate people, I hope, by example - and perhaps by excitement, by having productive ideas to make others feel involved.

I think the important thing is that there be plenty of newspapers, with plenty of different people controlling them, so that there are a variety of viewpoints, so there is a choice for the public. This is the freedom of the press that is needed.