The whole idea behind the "Who's Cribbing?" story seems to be a lot like the college essay writing process. Although students' dilemma does not involve plagiarism across (as opposed to through) time, it is very similar in that we seem to be haunted by this idea that a handful of exceptional people have already written the good essays. The ones that make fun of the process itself, or mock the very essay question, or wittily proclaim that persons individuality by being different, have been taken. This essentially forbids us from writing anything remotely similar to a vast collection of essays we will never see (I equate this to playing pin the tail on the donkey with no donkey), much like Mr. Lewis finds himself constantly stalked by an obscure unknowable writer from the past, sapping his ideas.
Most of the short stories in science fiction have an cautionary theme, especially in Cold war era material, however, there are also the ones that simply critique humanity as a whole. For instance in "Teething Ring" not only is the woman completely unaware that something entirely otherworldly is occurring, there is the indirectly mentioned league and classes of civilizations that we apparently were not invited to. Perhaps this is the authors way of saying that though we may have the technology of a scientifically advanced people, we are still to childish and naive too solve even our most petty of social issues.
