Facts or conditions that are accepted as true and do not need to be proved or questioned.
From Old English 'giefan' (to give), with the suffix '-en' forming a past participle, then made plural. The meaning shifted to 'things that are given to us as already established.'
In mathematics and logic, 'givens' are the starting assumptions you're allowed to work with—but fascinatingly, every field from law to science depends on agreeing which 'givens' to accept, which is why disagreements about basic facts are so dangerous to rational debate.
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