Concepts
- Much of A Gift From Earth revolves around Niven's idea that organ transplants would lead to a shortage of suitable donors, causing citizens to support widespread capital punishment for even trivial crimes, in order to ward off the effects of their own aging and death. This theme recurs in other Niven stories, particularly the Gil Hamilton stories.
- References in the book suggest that it takes place in about 2400, but this is somewhat inconsistent with other Known Space books.
Read more about this topic: A Gift From Earth
Famous quotes containing the word concepts:
“Germany collapsed as a result of having engaged in a struggle for empire with the concepts of provincial politics.”
—Albert Camus (1913–1960)
“It is impossible to dissociate language from science or science from language, because every natural science always involves three things: the sequence of phenomena on which the science is based; the abstract concepts which call these phenomena to mind; and the words in which the concepts are expressed. To call forth a concept, a word is needed; to portray a phenomenon, a concept is needed. All three mirror one and the same reality.”
—Antoine Lavoisier (1743–1794)
“When you have broken the reality into concepts you never can reconstruct it in its wholeness.”
—William James (1842–1910)