Project Hail Mary

by Andy Weir

She looked out the barred window toward the launchpad in the distance. “But I learned a lot. I actually liked it. People nowadays…they have no idea how good they have it. The past was unrelenting misery for most people. And the further back in time you go, the worse it was.” She stood and meandered around the room. “For fifty thousand years, right up to the industrial revolution, human civilization was about one thing and one thing only: food. Every culture that existed put most of their time, energy, manpower, and resources into food. Hunting it, gathering it, farming it, ranching it, storing it, distributing it…it was all about food. “Even the Roman Empire. Everyone knows about the emperors, the armies, and the conquests. But what the Romans really invented was a very efficient system of acquiring farmland and transportation of food and water.” She walked to the other side of the room. “The industrial revolution mechanized agriculture. Since then, we’ve been able to focus our energies on other things. But that’s only been the last two hundred years. Before that, most people spent most of their lives directly dealing with food production.”