William Ian Miller pinpoints the key difficulty in dealing with compensation for bodily loss: the market price of the lost part cannot match the value of its former contribution to the unmolested organism. Lex talionis affords a solution to this disparity by enabling the victim to opt for incurring a reciprocal loss in lieu of accepting monetary compensation offered by the party responsible for his injury. The ensuing threat of losing a valuable organ inspires the perpetrator to raise his offer to the level implicit in its ownership.