The questions we ask

Studies regularly appear that confirm, or at minimum suggest, that far more business is going on in the plant world than most people have ever suspected (animists excepted). Some scientists argue that plants memorize, listen, communicate, "think," and even demonstrate self-awareness in ways long considered -- at least among other scientists -- exclusive to a few select animals, like us. And because these new studies, like those of Stefano Mancuso described here, call into question the practice and value of conventional anthropocentric approaches, they carry obvious philosophical implications. 

I have yet to read Mancuso's book The Incredible Journey of Plants. For now, the intriguing quote from The Guardian article is:

"My personal opinion is that there is no life that is not aware of itself. For me, it's impossible to imagine any form of life that is not able to be intelligent, to solve problems."

It's an academic cliche that the greatest research challenge is always finding the right question to ask. The work of  Mancuso, Suzanne Simard,  Peter Wohlleben, and others threatens to disrupt, even invert, our common understanding of the world around us. In essence, they are suggesting that we look at botanically dense places like Potomac Creek (or a tropical jungle, an old growth forest, etc.) and ask something counterintuitive: "How can this fecund, complex mass of long-established plants NOT be communicating, signaling, aiding, and otherwise richly interacting with each other -- e.g., 'wise' (to use Simard's adjective)  and alive in ways we usually associate with animals?" Put that way, it seems silly to have ever asked anything else. The obvious follow up is to conduct original experiments to see what plants are actually up to.

In his The Guardian interview, Mancuso asserts that most of his botanist critics are retired. He hints at an almost Kuhnian resistance to new, inconvenient research questions and data that challenge old paradigms. Perhaps the holders of traditional scientific views that plants are essentially passive, "semi-living organic machines" will have to die off before new ideas can become commonplace. And perhaps it's not as simple as that.

But all of this is utterly fascinating. Where there's smoke, there's fire, and there seems little doubt that our limited human understanding of plants is expanding, and quite rapidly. It is an exciting time to be alive, as they say. 

And that may well have always been the case for the plants. 

Just what are they up to? Potomac Creek (R. Singh)