Why Do Birds

It's the early 21st century. Ed Stone says he's been in suspended animation since the 1930s. He says he was kidnapped by aliens. He says they sent him forth on a mission: to convince the nations of the world to build a massive vault, a mile on each side, in which humanity's billions will lie in suspension and survive the impending destruction of the Earth.
Ed Stone says all these things, and the strangest part is that people believe him - ordinary people and powerful people alike. So begins Why Do Birds, a classically science-fictional novel of ideas and quite possibly Damon Knight's most haunting work, a terrifying tale of deceit and human folly. "One of his great gifts," says Locus of Knight, "is that he takes an initial situation or idea and thinks, and thinks, and thinks."