The sentience or otherwise of plants.

[Gunter]

I believe that plants have a baseline awareness that all life does, and that this is the same basic state that facilitates cognition given the appropriate synapses, as such I believe the thoughts of plants are inchoate so to speak.

[Micromegas]

Beware - long post ahead…

Some really good posts here again and certainly it is a large topic to cover. I'm tempted to go a little bit Buddhist and shut my mouth, because I’ve been wary of over-philosophizing in the past few years, and because perhaps the answer only exists in self-reflective silence, within the totality of the self - but I won't, just yet...

its all god

all reality is sentient

This certainly resonates with me.

But I do believe within the all-knowing all-encompassing timeless/spaceless Creation there is a hierarchy of being. But what applies to the largest being (like the sun), must also apply to the smallest. I take that view because I think all things are 'besouled' or ‘with spirit’. However, the type of sentience may vary due to each being have a different position in the cosmos and therefore a different level or type of experience…

This is a complicated issue, however. For example, a 'waterfall spirit' is definitely a sentient being to me (it communicates and is aware and responsive to my presence)... but what about the water? Because it is always flowing and has no beginning or end where is it's spirit or soul located? While I believe a rock to be a living thing with spirit, what happens if you break that rock into a thousand pieces?

But, in particular, there seems to be something unique about human awareness in this middle world that I can't put my finger on. That perhaps we are here - to state the old adage - to help creation to experience itself. That the subjective quality we possess is important in raising consciousness in a ascending way, until unity is achieved and there is *peace on earth*!

Now I was walking in the hills of Adelaide yesterday thinking about all of this... I was walking on the back of the ancestral spirit Yurrebilla, who is said to have fallen - in the act of dying - and created the mountain range. I believe these ancestral stories have an element of truth. Yurrebilla was a sentient being whose deeds and mischief created a landscape, and when he died his life energy went into the earth and re-emerged as the native flora and fauna. Now each one of those plants and animals has a spirit and a sentience of it's own, but are embedded in the higher order being of the ancestral giant Yurrebilla. Yurrebilla himself is embedded in the higher order sentience of the Earth... the Earth in a higher order of the Creator, God. But all these things have sentience and awareness to some degree.

(By the way I find if you go far enough out, out, out into these higher order elements you eventually end back within yourself, your heart - the universe within the universe where dissonance and harmony, subjective/objective become unified in a state of peace and well-being. Like being a plant!)

Now, of course, scientifically speaking Mt Lofty was created by geological activity millions of years ago from forces in the earth, and the plants and animals came into life through 'selection' according to the ecology of the place. To do so they need not be sentient, nor must there be a God. There must simply be a process of creation that unfolds by whatever mechanisms.

Both are *true* interpretations of the phenomenon, approached from different angles. I know the first, because that resonates with my experience. I also believe the second, because, overall, it's demonstrably so... but when I add in God and feed my own awareness into the loop, both become abundantly true. Physical process in conjunction with a higher order *creative* process. Mt Lofty was formed by geological activity; but who's to say that wasn't Yurrebilla making love, or falling to the ground, figuratively or even literally? It could well be the same phenomenon interpreted in opposite ways. But I enjoy the world of duality and it seems, quite often, it's the duality that brings the truth to light...

i like the wiki definition of sentience "refers to the ability to feel or perceive subjectively, not necessarily including the faculty of self-awareness". sentience requires some subjectivity. im quite sympathetic to the hindu way of looking at the world as drama or a form of pantheism. if you define everything as god then sure enough, everything you come across is god. but that does not mean that everything has the capacity for subjective thought.

The idea of subjective experience is an interesting one, and for the most part I'd have to agree and say that humans possess a unique type of consciousness that is subjective. Perhaps this is because, as Archaea mentioned, it is because we posses certain synapses or brains structures that plants don't have. However, human awareness can become objective, too, or disappear altogether into the formless universal mind, but it seems we posses a complicated subjective view - that has a past, present and future, higher order thinking process etc. - that I don't notice in the average animal or plant. A very large tree, or exceptionally old animal may develop subjectivity, however...

Now what makes me think about plants not having subjective awareness is their process of dying. At the moment of transition into the afterworld, IMO. individual plants are reabsorbed into their higher order archetype - the Deva or jenio. During their life span they are sentient and aware in the way they communicate and are individually aware of what goes on around them... but they are harmoniously balanced and their subjective/objective is unified into simply being present in the now and responding accordingly. When the human balances these two poles, I believe, they also become present in a now where the self is assimilated into the whole, while individuality is mysteriously maintained. That is, off the wheel of birth and death. So I actually admire the sentience of plants and aim for that in my own life…

Furthermore the human subjective awareness is important in terms of an unfolding of creation, and for me it represents a culminating point in *evolution* which, if perfected will lead to a higher order of life on earth (perhaps where humans are more like plants!)... which leads me to the this:

they (plants) are making these chemicals cause they have been selected for for whatever reason.

I feel that, quite possibly, these plants have been selected to be the teachers of men (and women!). It's come online now because of the enormous threat our ego-centric views are presenting to the safety of earth... Some plants in particular are very skilled at teaching. Rather than thinking of this as an ego-centric assumption, I prefer to think of it as a chance to become less and less egoic and more in tune with the underlying *forces* of nature. The “Archaic Revivalâ€. That is, the plants are here to teach us to live in harmony, to drop the pretences, and discover that life is far more rich and alive in its sentience than we've given credit. It's a portal that the universal creator has opened for us and which we can step through - to find a greater understanding of ourselves and our purpose. I think people can be portals too - like Einstein or Buddha, Krishna or Bob Dylan!

These teacher plants - ayahuasca, san pedro, amanita, mushrooms, morning glory, datura, and many more - have a very advanced archetype with incredible amounts of knowledge into the unfolding processes of creation on Earth. A classic example of plant archetypes can be found in the paintings of Pablo Amaringo who routinely paints portraits of the plant spirits of certain ayahuasca admixtures that appear in similar form to many ayahuasqueros throughout the Amazon. Other beings such as the spirit of the Amazon river, forest and sky appear again and again in the form of sentient serpents. Similarly the Chavin and Moche civilisations carved huge friezes of supernatural beings they were routinely associating with. So did the aboriginal Australians, native American Indians, Mayans etc. So this spiritual take on reality is not something marginal but more so a type of apprehension of reality that has been replaced only recently. Now, perhaps these beings exist primarily in other dimensions (of mind) but I doubt it. I think they exist independently, beings in their own right.

The cosmology of ancient societies provides a lot of food for thought, and in many ways I think their “science†was more advanced than ours. But a blend of both would be best.

if the plants that make us trip are talking to us specifically then are the poisonous plants saying "fuck you" to all us humans?

Perhaps that's exactly what they are saying, or perhaps these simply aren't portals of teaching from the universal mind... or perhaps what they are teaching is duality, that nature isn't all flowers and rainbows and has a very powerful and lethal side.

from my perspective our brains are setup with all these receptors and mechanisms to function. our ability to perceive are world and process it through our conciousness is a very complicated task requiring many chemical messengers. some chemicals look similar to these chemicals and will effect the brain in specific ways.

This, again, is a very valid and observable view. There are observable chemical reactions occurring in our brains all the time. I don't want to discuss theory of mind too much cause I’d be out of my depth and because it's a slippery slope indeed. Overall I can't refute science with my spiritual waffle very easily, cause it’s an experience-based position!

But that the brain can be reduced to into component parts and functions is interesting, but still the sum is greater than the whole. Why can we describe *how* we are conscious, but not what consciousness *is*. The whole physical structure for me is a product of consciousness, ours and that of something of a higher order. Chemical reactions in the brain are symptoms not causes, of energy moving from the world of the “dreamtime†into this physical, temporal dimension. Symptoms, that is, of a higher order mechanism manifesting in a material world.

Since this is a physical world it requires a physical mechanism to be here. If you stop at matter, then that's fine... but if you don't then the brain and body becomes a portal for your higher self to live in the sensational middle world... with maybe a chance of becoming self-realised in the process!

if plants are communicating to us specifically then why can we synthesise these compounds in a lab and produce the exact result.

Can we? I seriously doubt this claim (examples, please!), because i believe the sum is greater than the whole. To synthesise a plant is to miss one vital ingredient, the spirit of the plant! But if we could, well then, only because the plants agreed to share their secrets with us...

for me its a case of occams razor. if an aspect isnt required for an explanation of a mechanism or just ad extra complexity when its not required then chop it away. especially if there is no empirical evidence for it.

This may be true but I think there is an aspect that requires some serious elucidation - Why on Earth are we here? Who am I? And what is this pesky thing called consciousness? No scientific or reductionist view answered these questions concretely for me, they’ve only described - marginally at best - a few mechanism of apparent causality... and to posit a God, Creator or Universal Mind actually reduces complexity by providing a larger, overarching framework for existence...

i am however, very science focused and approach all of these things from a very different perspective to many others. where others see spirits i see insights into my own conciousness, where some see magic rituals i see tools that help induce certain brainstates in a brain that is operating quite differently due to chemical influence. this forum would be boring if everyone thought exactly as i did just as would be boring if everyone thought as you did. im interested in other peoples ideas and hope that other people find some interesting point in my ideas. anyway, let the discussion continue.

Yeah I couldn't agree more. Differences of opinion are great if they don't become vitriolic, because they lead to a greater understanding of all the issues involved. Perception is a cagey rat, two truths are often more complementary than they at first appear. Did a Bing Bang issue forth all the elements of life in a primordial explosion of gas and heat... or did the timeless creator ejaculate his seed of consciousness into what was previously a void, the womb from which the child of matter has grown and been born? I'd say, probably both depending on your angle of inquiry.

of course these kinds of ideas don't make sense, as they can't be tested with humanity's current means...

Sure they can, only in Australia such means are illegal! Spiritual ideas are open for the testing to anyone, really...through plants or otherwise (drumming, meditation etc) but I guess so are scientific theories... since we don't have time to do everything, perhaps it's what falls in your lap that counts, and what your mind is suited to... I’m suited to one more than the other, and yet I don't see any reason science and spirituality can't fuse together, especially in the using of scientific knowledge to protect and enrich the earth... there's no reason we can't all get along and I think this thread is a classic example...

Thanks everyone for sharing your views, it's certainly made my ontology a little clearer, and raised a lot of questions... I’ve discovered philosophical and energetic nuances lately I’d certainly been missing.

Have a great day...

Micro

Edited January 17, 2008 by Micromegas

[folias]

The most obvious "proof" of the sentience of plants is by ingesting the psychoactive plants and actually experiencing the plant deva (which could be described as being the "oversoul" of the plant)

One can VERY commonly have this experience with cactus, mushrooms, salvia, ayahuasca and perhaps most especially ibogaine...

Perhaps, the "embarrassing" part of Ibogaine, according to the people who see how powerfully it does work compared to anything else out there (neuroscientists and such), is that people generally experience some sort of sentient being which identifies itself quite clearly. And that the nature of this experience of this being is often quite clearly correlated in the experiences of the people who take Ibogaine. It is a life review of some sort mediated by a consciousness.

The reductionists, by reducing phenomena to their most obvious physical elements, seem to feel that this "hallucinatory" element is some kind of side effect of the chemical effaciousness in Ibogaine detoxing heroin addicts for example. Of course, hallunicatory implies "not real" and therefore unimportant.

But in fact, what are these brain chemicals and how did they take the shape and nature that they took?

The plant concsiousness seems to actively take the person back in time to reassess and understand the nature and shape of their brain chemistry... their general wiring.

The plant will in fact rewire you at levels which are not physical!

My experience of Ibogaine in fact, was of having felt the physical body shut down to a degree (it is hard to move on a full dose of ibogaine) and in that case, the non-physical, hippy dippy new age , non-physical quantum components of living consciousness becomes ACTIVATED in this re-wiring and resetting of the human organism.

AND, those levels of consciousness are MUCH MORE complex and slippery and cannot be brought into the materialist reducing valve... because they are not of a material level!

For me, when ingesting ibogaine, it was beyond blindingly obvious that the plant spirit is interacting here, and it is not the mere feedback process of the chemical and how it supposedly works on the brain... I'm not quite clear on the present "mainstream scientific" explanations for how Ibogaine does work, but I am aware that top neurophysicians are very interested in it because it represents a juicy and mysterious area which is not easily reigned into traditional modes of understanding.

The point is - the reductionistic easily bucked ba$ed scientific paradigm must shift if we are ever to get with The Program.

Out of the very basic and over simplistic boring explanations of the reducing valve is this over expanding upward funnel, into which our forms of human knowing and understand become obviously inadequate, and then we must give it all up into being present to living intelligence and the present awareness of real knowledge as we can become aware of it.

And that is real and obvious contact which bears real fruit.

But recognising our ignorance (and real knowledge)- collective and individual is the first foolish step it seems not many in our culture are strong enough to take.

Julian.

[botanika]

Im hungry, so i think ill cook up some homegrown carrots and potatoes, eat them in front of a log fire that has a nice still life painting of flowers near it while watching a nature documentary. Might have a doobie after dinner.

Ethics is just another form of spirituality. Food and bed is god.

[botanika]

Have a watch of the bbc doco 'supernatural' hidden powers of animals and plants. Never new my aftershave had such an affect on plants!

[chilli]

Yeah, I have noticed plants actually lean away from me very slightly when I water them with no clothes on...

I mean, IF I did that... IF I watered them with no clothes on, I wouldn't be surprised if something like that happened hypothetically.

Okay, I admit it... I am completely naked right now.

[Teljkon]

adasas

Edited December 19, 2021 by Teljkon

[ballzac]

I don't think there have been any such experiments that have been found to be repeatable by reputable researchers. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but make sure you provide a reference to a reputable source. This doesn't mean that plants are not aware, or do not respond to their environment. The latter is definately well established and the former is impossible to prove.

There is a little too much anthropomorphosis in those 'experiments'. I mean really, why would a plant evolve to be able to sense a potential attacker when there is sweet fuck-all they can do to defend themselves?

[botanika]

Watch the BBC supernatural doco. Plant gets attacked by grub, sends out pheremones that attract wasps which in turn kill the grubs. There's plenty of things a plant can do and there's plenty of ways to communicate. It's also been documented that elephant fish use telepathy by using electrical signals to communicate like a telephone line. Watch time lapse photography of plants and you'll see how much likd animals they are. Nature's smart.

[Teljkon]

asd

Edited December 19, 2021 by Teljkon

[ballzac]

Watch time lapse photography of plants and you'll see how much likd animals they are. Nature's smart.

I certainly agree on both counts there. I just think that plants work on a different timescale and in a different way to humans. I mean c'mon, a polygraph? That's wishful thinking in my book.

[XipeTotec]

Indeed this is second hand information and I cant quoute the study but I doubt my mother would lie to me. Ill ask here where she read it.

if u r taliking about the plant assassin... I believe she read it in "the secret life of plants" (not to be mixed up with "the secret life of us".... which starred a guy who stomped on someones head, and didnt even get a conviction... but, thats another story.)

Edited January 24, 2008 by XipeTotec

[Teljkon]

asdasd

Edited December 19, 2021 by Teljkon

[XipeTotec]

dbl post

if it were a double post... then there would be 2.... y r u trying to deceive us?

[paradox]

Plant gets attacked by grub, sends out pheremones that attract wasps which in turn kill the grubs. There's plenty of things a plant can do and there's plenty of ways to communicate.

how about the bullhorn acacia in Guatemala which has a mutualistic symbiosis with a species of ant. the acacia produces little high protein pods of food for the ants & it has hollow thorns which the ants live in.

when the plant is attacked by harmful insects or animals the ants swarm the attacker.

there are heaps examples similar to this in nature. i guess these could be explained by evolution but it's very, very interesting nonetheless.

watching a climbing vine on time lapse, the plant appears to know exactly where to send it's tendril & you watch as the tendril navigates it's way to it's destination, they certainly appear to be very aware but it's like their perception functions in a slower dimension of time, relative to our own... or something.

[MORG]

i guess these could be explained by evolution but it's very, very interesting nonetheless.

Yeah, cos it's less remarkable if there's a sound explanation from dull, boring, reductionist, empirical theory.

Everyone needs a bit of Harry Potter.

[Teljkon]

afdasd

Edited December 19, 2021 by Teljkon

[bogfrog]

*bump*