Slashdot Mirror
Once Considered Outlandish, the Idea That Plants Help Their Relatives is Taking Root (sciencemag.org)
An anonymous reader shares a report: A Canadian biologist planted the seed of the idea more than a decade ago, but many plant biologists regarded it as heretical -- plants lack the nervous systems that enable animals to recognize kin, so how can they know their relatives? But with a series of recent findings, the notion that plants really do care for their most genetically close peers -- in a quiet, plant-y way -- is taking root.
. Some species constrain how far their roots spread, others change how many flowers they produce, and a few tilt or shift their leaves to minimize shading of neighboring plants, favoring related individuals.
"We need to recognize that plants not only sense whether it's light or dark or if they've been touched, but also whom they are interacting with," says Susan Dudley, a plant evolutionary ecologist at McMaster University in Hamilton, Canada, whose early plant kin recognition studies sparked the interest of many scientists. Beyond broadening views of plant behavior, the new work may have a practical side. In September 2018, a team in China reported that rice planted with kin grows better, a finding that suggested family ties can be exploited to improve crop yields. "It seems anytime anyone looks for it, they find a kin effect," says Andre Kessler, a chemical ecologist at Cornell University.
"We need to recognize that plants not only sense whether it's light or dark or if they've been touched, but also whom they are interacting with," says Susan Dudley, a plant evolutionary ecologist at McMaster University in Hamilton, Canada, whose early plant kin recognition studies sparked the interest of many scientists. Beyond broadening views of plant behavior, the new work may have a practical side. In September 2018, a team in China reported that rice planted with kin grows better, a finding that suggested family ties can be exploited to improve crop yields. "It seems anytime anyone looks for it, they find a kin effect," says Andre Kessler, a chemical ecologist at Cornell University.
I've heard something eerie similar on TED quite a lot time ago: Suzanne Simard: How trees talk to each other | TED Talk, and Greg Gage: Electrical experiments with plants that count and communicate | TED Talk. There are many other TED talks about the topic of plants' nervous system, intelligence and communication. This kinda invalidates the whole premise of vegetarianism but I don't want to argue about that now.
Can recognize each other, why not vegetables? After all they are more intelligent.
And besides that Mr. tree 'wants' you to eat that apple and deposit the seeds somewhere else in your manure. I personally eat meat because in my view everything eats every other damned thing in this cruel old world. But I think vegans remain morally safe eating plants. Janes, an Indian sect, are known to wait under trees until fruit falls. You are welcome.
"No fear. No envy. No meanness." Liam Clancy
It probably isn't necessary to know exactly what people should be eating to maximize their health. It's far more important to know what kind of things to stay away from to avoid the worst negative health consequences, and we've got a good enough idea there. No one is telling the general population to eat more sugar.
... that at the very least, many plants attack their foes. Many plants produce chemicals in their roots or leaf litter that hinder plant growth or seed germination but which they themselves are immune to. And when I say "long known", observations of such allelopathathic effects date back to at least Theophrastus in 300 BC, and most agricultural societies have long had rules about how "Plant A will grow well with B but poorly with C", which can generally be seen as allelopathy. In research, most cases of concern are where weeds produce chemicals that hinder commercial crops, but it also works the other way around - for example, rice (which they mention above) creates root exudates hinder the germination of competing seedlings.
Of course, there are non-chemical ways (such as shade, root growth, etc) to hinder foes without hurting yourself or your brethren, but the chemical ways are usually the most striking, as their purposes are so unambiguous. While shade, root growth, etc can be natural consequences of your own development, you don't invest energy in producing secondary metabolites unless you want them to accomplish something with them.
Musk needs a safer hobby than Twitter. Fire juggling? Cage fighting? Solo hot air balloon trips?
carrot juice is murder!
Jokes aside nobody's suggestion plants are sentient, just that they seem to have behaviors that favor similar plants. That could just as easily be an evolved survival mechanism. Plants still don't have central nervous systems.
Though I do think it would be cool in a sci-fi sort of way to evolve beyond the need for consuming living organisms. That said, we ain't there, and while I eat a mostly vegetarian diet it's for health reasons, not for the sake of animals. I've got a dog for Pete's sake, and I ain't feeding her carrots.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
If this research means that plants have a degree of sentience, will killing plants be seen as exploitive?
There is commentary elsewhere in this thread that vegans could still eat fruit and nuts, because these are 'given' by plants as a reproductive attractant, not requiring death of the plant.
However, I see a big BUT coming. The difference between vegans and vegetarians is that vegetarians eat products nonlethally derived from animals, such as honey and dairy. Vegans consider these products to be 'exploiting' animals, so they are off the plate. The most advanced and morally pure vegan logicians are going to argue, how is an apple different from the milk of a cow? Because Nature intends that apples be eaten by animals that will derive nutrition from the apple while spreading its seeds, humans would be depriving the apple tree's ally species of this natural nutrient. Furthermore, very few apples consumed by humans result in natural apple propagation.