He confides to her that he has visited the surface of the Earth without permission, and that he saw other humans living outside the world of the Machine. There, he tells her of his disenchantment with the sanitised, mechanical world. He persuades a reluctant Vashti to endure the journey (and the resultant unwelcome personal interaction) to his room. Kuno, however, is a sensualist and a rebel. Vashti is content with her life, which, like most inhabitants of the world, she spends producing and endlessly discussing secondhand 'ideas'. The two main characters, Vashti and her son Kuno, live on opposite sides of the world. Communication is made via a kind of instant messaging/video conferencing machine with which people conduct their only activity: the sharing of ideas and what passes for knowledge. Travel is permitted, but is unpopular and rarely necessary.

Each individual now lives in isolation below ground in a standard room, with all bodily and spiritual needs met by the omnipotent, global Machine. The story describes a world in which most of the human population has lost the ability to live on the surface of the Earth. The story, set in a world where humanity lives underground and relies on a giant machine to provide their needs, predicted technologies such as instant messaging and the Internet. In 1973 it was also included in The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume Two. After being voted one of the best novellas up to 1965, it was included that same year in the populist anthology Modern Short Stories.

After initial publication in The Oxford and Cambridge Review (November 1909), the story was republished in Forster's The Eternal Moment and Other Stories in 1928. The Machine Stops is a science fiction short story by E.

The machine stops and other stories