Modern aircraft manufacturers don't have much on Orville and Wilbur. Today's jet airplanes use the same principles of aerodynamics that the Wright brothers used in 1903 to get their Flyer in the air.
But how exactly do airplanes fly?
Flight requires two things: thrust and lift. Thrust is the forward motion provided by a propeller or jet engine. (A propeller, by the way, uses the same principles discussed below to create lift, but it uses that lift to move the plane forward instead of up.)