How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #7
Even the wilderness is carefully husbanded there, and though that forest had been logged for centuries there were no waste places in it, no desolations of stumps, no eroded slopes. It seemed that every tree in it was accounted for, and that not one grain of sawdust from our mill went unused. (13.31)
When nature gives you so little, you make full use of what it does give you. When nature gives you a lot, you should probably do the same. Just to be safe.
Quote #8
Being so strictly defined and limited by nature, the sexual urge of Gethenians is really not much interfered with by society: there is less coding, channeling, and repressing of sex there than in any bisexual society I know of. (13.36)
Nature not only defines technology like houses and cars in a civilization. It also defines the way people act in society, even when it comes to picking up dates.
Quote #9
The sledge was heavy loaded; Estraven guessed the total weight to pull at something over 300 pounds. It was hard to pull in the fluffy snow, though it was as handy as a well-designed little boat […]. (15.73)
When life gives you lemons, you make sledges. No, wait. When your world consists of permanent winter, you develop really, really good sledges. Yeah, that's right.