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The God Machine

Thomas and Emma, a thousand years into the future, are ordered by a computer, the “god” of their society, to get married. The computer knows their genes will produce a master mathematician, whom the society sorely needs. Even though they’ve never met before, the young couple discover they have many common interests—“archaic” books and popular music of the twentieth century—and they fall in love, which is forbidden. The unhappy computer issues another order: get divorced.

In the future, a powerful computer controls who can have babies and get married. Against all odds, two young people break the rules and fall in love. They fight back against the machine that wants to keep them apart.

The cycle of procreation and the institution of marriage is regulated by a master computer in the future. Surprisingly, a young couple over-ride the system and fall in love. They rebel against the machine that tries to separate them.

CBS Radio Mystery Theater is a radio drama series created by Himan Brown that was broadcast on CBS Radio Network affiliates from 1974 to 1982, and later in the early 2000s was repeated by the NPR satellite feed. In New York City it was not aired by the then all-news WCBS but by its originating station, WOR, which produced and announced it as simply Radio Mystery Theater.

Wikipedia. CC BY-SA 4.0. Updated Jul 20, 2026.

“The God Machine.” CBS Radio Mystery Theater. Radio broadcast, January 28, 1980.

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