The BCS theory injected two powerful ideas into the collective consciousness
of theoretical physics: pairing and spontaneous symmetry breaking. In the 50
years since the seminal work of Bardeen, Cooper, and Schrieffer, those ideas
have found important use in areas quite remote from the stem application to
metallic superconductivity. This is a brief and eclectic sketch of some
highlights, emphasizing relatively recent developments in QCD and in the theory
of quantum statistics, and including a few thoughts about future directions. A
common theme is the importance of symmetry {\it transmutation}, as opposed to
the simple {\it breaking} of electromagnetic U(1) symmetry in classic
metallic superconductors.Comment: 25 pages, 4 figures. Contribution to "Fifty Years of Bardeen, Cooper,
and Schrieffer'', to be published by World Scientific. Also to appear in
IJMP