"The Machine Stops" is already a fitting name for the story itself. Since the Machine is at the core of humanity, the end of the story is caused by the Machine. However, in the ashes of the Machine's downfall comes the return of those exiled out of the Machine's realm. Those who stayed tied to the Machine met their end, but the rest didn't. Therefore, another worthy title for the "Machine Stops" would be "A Short Pause on Humanity".
This name accounts for various occurrences in the story. For one, the Machine is known for feeding off the ideas of humans, to the point where the regurgitation of ideas is the norm. Nothing is new, and everything is grey. This lifestyle was so systematic and irregular, that one could say humanity lost its course. Though people such as Vashti accepted this life, their acceptance only came as a consequence of the numbness the Machine created. This time period is accounted for by the "pause on humanity". "Pause" symbolizes the seizing of normal human practices, those done by the characters' ancestors. Anything that could resemble what we see today as human -- consciousness, deeper thinking, and individuality, has much less of a presence in the pause on humanity. However, with such a "pause" comes a "resume", in this case, the end of the story. The rise of exiled peoples by the destruction of the machine allows humanity to return to its past form and to resume itself.
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