Saturday, January 4, 2014

My African violet may be smarter than your honor student



Do you talk to your plants? Sing to your African violets?

Maybe your plants do more than hear you. Maybe the African violets are snapping their fingers, figuratively speaking, maybe they're wishing you’d had voice lessons….

Michael Pollan, fount of wisdom in all things food, especially plants, has written a blushingly provocative piece in The New Yorker about "The Intelligent Plant." If you're convinced you're an educated person, I think you'll be glad if you read it.


Did you know that pole beans can deliberately and unerringly grow toward a sturdy pole stuck in the ground a couple feet away? It's not a trial and error process—time lapse photography proves that the bean plant somehow "knows" how to grow and reach out in the right direction to get to the pole.

Did you know that the same drugs used to anesthetize animals will also put a plant "to sleep"? For example, a drugged Venus flytrap won't snap shut on an insect.



Did you know that trees in a forest are connected to each other by their root systems? That mature trees will "send" nutrients to young seedlings that aren't tall enough to get needed sunlight? That intermingled evergreens and deciduous trees will "swap" excess nutrients underground, back and forth, in a cycle that matches their different seasonal needs?

One scientist, the late ethnobotanist Tim Plowman, was serenely detached from the whole "plant intelligence" discussion: "They can eat light, isn't that enough?"

Some scientists aren't ready to say that plants are intelligent.

Other scientists—more open-minded "plant neurobiologists" who embrace the indicated paradigm shift—point to repeatedly documented plant behavior that is directed, purposeful, self-organized, self-adjusting and self-sustaining.

Isn't that the kind of thing that intelligent humans do?

The next time you sing to your African violets, try channeling Aretha Franklin and give them a little R-E-S-P-E-C-T.






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