“The Trouble with Bubbles” (“Plaything”) January 1953

Nat Hull goes to pick up his friend Julia at a party where a contest is taking place. People construct their own Worldcraft bubbles, worlds they create and arrange like gods. After middle-aged Lora Becker wins, she shows off her carefully crafted little world, then smashes it in a frenzy, as do most of the others with their little bubble worlds. Nat, Julia, and Bart discuss why it happened and what people’s motives are in building these worlds in the first place. People are bored because of too much leisure time, and they are disappointed that no other inhabited planets have been found. They create these substitute worlds and destroy them, perhaps out of cruelty, or just boredom. Nat proposes a law to ban Worldcraft and its bubbles, but it is easily defeated. Then Bart reveals life has been found in another system. Worldcraft immediately becomes irrelevant, and Nat happily ponders a world where bored, frustrated gods no longer punish and destroy the worlds they created. Then an unexpected earthquake hits, killing tens of thousands. It seems it was an act of God.