The Irony of the Nursery ("The Veldt")
In "The Veldt," the parents of the family have installed a virtual reality nursery for their children to use and enjoy, both creating an easy way to entertain them and encouraging the use of their imagination. Rather than helping the children, however, this nursery becomes an agent of harm: they become cruel and selfish creatures, even killing their own parents to sustain their horrible lifestyle.
The Irony of the Falling Star ("Kaleidoscope")
In "Kaleidoscope," Hollis is one of the astronauts hurtling to their deaths following unexpected damage to their spacecraft. As he is about to enter Earth's atmosphere, he thinks that he will be turned into ash that will have a tiny, impersonal, pragmatic effect on the Earth's ecosystem and industrialism. The effect, however, is just the opposite: a child sees him, thinking he is a falling star, and his mother encourages him to make a wish. The effect of Hollis's death is the encouragement of imagination, rather than the imagination-stifling fertilizing fate he imagined for himself.
The Irony of Segregation ("The Other Foot")
In "The Other Foot," Mars is entirely populated by African-Americans. When they learn of the impending arrival of white people, they set up the colony as an ironic reversal of the racial segregation enforced by the Jim Crow laws back on Earth; these new laws are prejudiced against white people instead of black people.
The Irony of the Man ("The Man")
In "The Man," the travelling crew finds a joyful civilization in the wake of a figure known as the Man. The lieutenant stays on the planet while the captain leaves in search of this Man. Ironically, the captain can never find him, always seeming one step behind, while the lieutenant learns that the Man is still on the first planet, present with those who believe in him. The man who searches can't find him, and the one who is content finds him without even searching.
The Irony of the Marionette ("Marionettes, Inc.")
In "Marionettes, Inc.," the main character buys a marionette (robotic clone) of himself so as to relieve his own responsibilities. The robot, however, decides he wants to continue living the main character's life, so he traps him in the box the robot came in, creating a cruel situational irony where the machine has taken the place of the man, and the man has taken the place of the machine.
