MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
What happens on Earth once humans are gone? That question is at the heart of a 1950 short story by Ray Bradbury called "There Will Come Soft Rains."
JONATHAN ELLER: It's a story of the last 24 hours in what remains of humanity, and all that remains is the technology.
AILSA CHANG, HOST:
Jonathan Eller is a retired English professor. He helped create the Ray Bradbury Center at Indiana University Indianapolis. The story has no human characters, just a home filled with autonomous technology that cooks, entertains and cleans up after its late residents. That's because it is set the day after a nuclear war.
KELLY: Shortly after it was published, NBC broadcast a radio adaptation of the story on its show "Dimension X."
(SOUNDBITE OF RADIO SHOW, "DIMENSION X")
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #1: (As narrator) It was a good house. It contained all the latest automatic devices from talking book recorders to singing clocks.
(SOUNDBITE OF ALARM CLOCK CHIMING)
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #2: (As clock) Tick tock, seven o'clock. Time to rise. Open your eyes.
KELLY: This week, the story is getting renewed attention.
ELLER: He wanted humanity to always be able to grow beyond the dangers and the threats that we create for ourselves. And this is why he wrote this story - a day in the life of the house. And the house says, today is August 4, 2026.
CHANG: The story begins on August 4, 2026. Well, I am very happy to report that today, August 5, we humans are still here.
KELLY: Hooray.
CHANG: And our smart speakers and Wi-Fi thermostats are not our only legacy yet.
KELLY: Jonathan Eller says Bradbury wasn't so much betting on the demise of humanity as working to prevent it. Here's Bradbury speaking with NPR in 2004.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR CONTENT)
RAY BRADBURY: I warn. I make warnings, but I don't predict a cataclysm.
KELLY: In other words, he called out to future humanity - this week in particular. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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