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The Machine Stops
By E. M. Forster.
Science Fiction short
story.
Published by Suzeteo
Enterprises.
First published 1909.
Hardcover.
ISBN-10: 1645941566
ISBN-13: 9781645941569
Description:
In our modern era, we
like to congratulate ourselves for our sophistication, knowing that we have
doubtless created a world that our feckless ancestors could never have
imagined. Actually reading the works of those ancestors would disabuse us of
any such notion, and E. M. Forster's The Machine Stops is a case in
point. Not only does it seem that Forster has contemplated the ubiquitous
'Zoom' call, but he correctly sensed the deadening of the soul that would
accompany the faux-mastery of Nature, expressing itself through technology.
In The
Machine Stops the height of mankind's advances was The Machine, and it
cared for every aspect of human experience, and anticipated every human need,
until such time that there was nothing left for humans to do except eat, and,
if the algorithm approved, procreate; and when the algorithm decided Euthanasia
was due, then Euthanasia was happily accepted. The Machine was not just the
pinnacle of human ingenuity, it was Progress Incarnate. And then... the Machine
Stopped. Today, we hail our own progress, technological and societal. If our
machine stops, what then? Do we really suppose it is eternal?
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