Aesthetics has become too important to be left to the aesthetes. To succeed, hard-nosed engineers, real estate developers, and MBAs must take aesthetic communication, and aesthetic pleasure, seriously. We, their customers, demand it.

European nations began World War I with a glamorous vision of war, only to be psychologically shattered by the realities of the trenches. The experience changed the way people referred to the glamour of battle; they treated it no longer as a positive quality but as a dangerous illusion.

Glamour is all about transcending this world and getting to an idealized, perfect place.

How we feel about the evolving future tells us who we are as individuals and as a civilization: Do we search for stasis-a regulated, engineered world? Or do we embrace dynamism-a world of constant creation, discovery, and competition?

Progress through trial and error depends not only on making trials, but on recognizing errors.

The impulse for personal adornment is hard to stamp out.

Medicare is immune from the competitive pressures that force private insurers to pay attention to what patients and doctors want.