Books › How we'll live on Mars
How we'll live on Mars
77 pages
A thrilling, pragmatic roadmap to humanity's next great frontier that makes science fiction feel like tomorrow's news.
What it feels like
Reading this book feels like sitting down with a brilliant, wildly optimistic engineer who is sketching out the blueprint for humanity's survival on a napkin. The pace is brisk and urgent, driven by a compelling mix of existential anxiety about Earth's future and an infectious enthusiasm for our technological potential. It balances the sobering reality of climate change and planetary vulnerability with a deeply hopeful, awe-inspiring look at what human ingenuity can achieve. The prose is crisp and journalistic, stripping away dense academic jargon to make astrophysics and terraforming accessible to anyone. It is a perfect read for futurists, space nerds, and dreamers who want to feel the exhilarating vertigo of standing on the precipice of a multi-planetary future.
- Mood
- forward-looking
- awe-inspiring
- hopeful
- anxious
- Tone
- visionary
- urgent
- pragmatic
- enthusiastic
- Pace
- brisk
- Themes
- technological optimism · human survival · the frontier spirit · existential risk · planetary engineering
- The writing
- Clear, journalistic, and highly accessible, translating complex engineering and astrophysics into engaging, everyday language.
- The arc
- Begins with a sobering assessment of Earth's fragility before launching into an exhilarating, hopeful vision of human ingenuity and survival.
- Who it's for
- Futurists, science enthusiasts, and anyone who looks up at the night sky and wonders how we might actually get there.
Content notes
- existential dread
- climate change anxiety
About the book
"It sounds like science fiction, but Stephen Petranek considers it fact: Within twenty years, humans will live on Mars. We'll need to. In this sweeping, provocative book that mixes business, science, and human reporting, Petranek makes the case that living on Mars is an essential back-up plan for humanity and explains in fascinating detail just how it will happen. The race is on. Private companies, driven by iconoclastic entrepreneurs, such as Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Paul Allen, and Sir Richard Branson; Dutch reality show and space mission Mars One; NASA; and the Chinese government are among the many groups competing to plant the first stake on Mars and open the door for human habitation. Why go to Mars? Life on Mars has potential life-saving possibilities for everyone on earth. Depleting water supplies, overwhelming climate change, and a host of other disasters--from terrorist attacks to meteor strikes--all loom large. We must become a space-faring species to survive. We have the technology not only to get humans to Mars, but to convert Mars into another habitable planet. It will likely take 300 years to "terraform" Mars, as the jargon goes, but we can turn it into a veritable second Garden of Eden. And we can live there, in specially designed habitations, within the next twenty years. In this exciting chronicle, Petranek introduces the circus of lively characters all engaged in a dramatic effort to be the first to settle the Red Planet. How We'll Live on Mars brings firsthand reporting, interviews with key participants, and extensive research to bear on the question of how we can expect to see life on Mars within the next twenty years"--
Description from Open Library.
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