Trees/plants as sentient beings...thoughts please

[Fungus]

Nice idea, but I for one am very doubtful of how much truth is in this story... I have heard it before, and seen similar tests done with unreproducable results. I think some of it probably has its roots in reality, but then Chinese whispers and exaggeration prevailed.

 

Sloth,

If you come to my place, I'll show you a plant in my living room, that sweats and curses every time it "senses", that I get the scissors out . And you're invited to bring your wife too .

And did the polygraph test include assessing the plants telling lies too .

Edited August 31, 2011 by Fungus

[Tony Croft aka hamadryad]

Sloth,

If you come to my place, I'll show you a plant in my living room, that sweats and curses every time it "senses", that I get the scissors out . And you're invited to bring your wife too .

And did the polygraph test include assessing the plants telling lies too .

 

 

for a dutch guy your humour is very "english"!

[Fungus]

for a dutch guy your humour is very "english"!

 

Next typical Dutch question then. Did they assess plants having a "sense" of humour too, because my plants have a good laugh when I tell a killing of aphids involving joke, that is, as long as I keep the scissors in the drawer .

[Tony Croft aka hamadryad]

Next typical Dutch question then. Did they assess plants having a "sense" of humour too, because my plants have a good laugh when I tell a killing of aphids involving joke, that is, as long as I keep the scissors in the drawer .

 

You mess up the placement of your words from time to time but i always get your drift:lol:

[Fungus]

A tree does not know that it is a tree; it simply is a collection of hormones, chemicals and chemical bonds that react to external and internal stimuli. I do believe that they can and do react to being harmed much as a human or animal would do; by sending out signals.

 

Harmony ,

Believe ? As a matter of fact they do, plants are able of communication through feromones within the same species and trees with insects and hyphae of mycelia of ectomycorrhizal macrofungi, as a wolf in sheep's clothing mimicked by a parasitic Armillaria species. See : Communication of plants.

[RobArb]

how do plants communicate through vast distances then?

 

There was a good article a while back in the national geographic about trees in savannah in africa (i think) being grazed upon by herding animals

 

The long and short of it was that one tree that was grazed upon sent out chemical signals of sorts to the others to warn them and they grew more spikes!! But if i remember this was over a vast distance.

 

Is allelopathy that powerful?

[Fungus]

how do plants communicate through vast distances then? sent out chemical signals of sorts to the others to warn them and they grew more spikes!! But if i remember this was over a vast distance. Is allelopathy that powerful?

 

Feromones travel over long distance by wind, so in this case, only trees will profit if they're downwind from the attacked trees.

 

Humans (and wild boars or domesticated pigs) have a small organ up their nose, called the vomero nasal organ, which registers feromones secreted by both sexes without us becoming consciously aware of the effect it has on our hormonal system, brain and behaviour.

Women in their fertile years regularely sharing the same rooms (mother-daughters, same sex partners, nuns), synchronize their ovulation.

A room filled with copuline, a female sex hormone, makes heterosexual men so horny, that they don't care anymore what the "targetted" woman looks like, they just want to ....

And women can 98 % correct smell whether sweaty t-shirts were worn by women or men by sniffing the armpits, while men only can do this with 95 % accuracy.

Edited August 31, 2011 by Fungus

[RobArb]

wish i studied chemistry better than i did now:lol:

[Daniël Bos]

Ok, so now we've learned that women are better at smelling sweat than men, good for them.

Back to the question: "are trees sentient beings, your thoughts please"

There is obviously no scientific evidence to suggest they are, I do know several people however that are quite sensitive to "moods" of trees. I've seen people get physically sick when we gathered under a certain old oak, only to be told later by the land owner that that happens to quite a few of his visitors on that spot. They used to hang people on that tree...

I've seen the milking figures of cows housed in places where the dowser said cows shouldn't be placed being significantly less than their neighbours.

 

There are things that have not been explained by man, the urge to ridcule what we don't understand is strong, even Gerrit's first reaction was to mock a previous poster.

 

I certainly "feel" in awe when in the prescence of old growth and will happily acknowledge them as sentient beings, it feels right to me.

[Mark Bolam]

Hey man, if they don't want to die then why are they, like, made of wood?