Philip K. Dick’s 1953 story “The Trouble with Bubbles” is set in an era where humans have explored deep into outer space, but never succeeded in finding life. Yearning to connect with other worlds and life-forms, consumers begin to buy a product called “Worldcraft” through which they can build and “Own [Their] Own World,” which are cultivated to the point of producing sentient life and fully realized civilizations (most Worldcraft-owners eventually destroy their worlds in what Dick described as a “neurotic” “orgy of breaking” intended to “amuse some god suffering from ennui”).
