 | Mind-blowing science on plant intelligence and consciousness written in an easy-to-comprehend style, The Light Eaters describes plants as “a masterclass in living to one’s fullest, weirdest, most resourceful potential.” Plants dominate Earth, comprising 80% of total living organisms by weight and the earliest plants created the oxygen that allowed animal life to exist. And all animal life still depends on plants—either by eating plant life or consuming the animals who do—or both. As one scientist says: “plants are the primary organisms, and we are the secondary ones. We are fully dependent on them. Without them, we would not be able to survive.” |
Incredible facts:
- Plants share the same neurotransmitters as animals (including humans) to convey signals throughout their bodies.
- Simple cellular “eyes” may allow plants to see and grow toward sunlight.
- Language among plants may include “clicks” that become more frequent when plants are stressed. They also communicate by scent to attract pollinators or alert their neighbors to danger.
- Plants cooperate with and share space with their close kin, but compete aggressively with nonkin.
- A seedling root has 48 hours to find water and nutrients, and then push up a seedling, or it will die.
 | Early plants were a union of an algae-like organism and a photosynthesizing bacteria. Humans are also symbiotic with microbes: “[Bacteria] were on the planet far before any larger life forms arose, and were wildly successful, adapting perfectly to the chemistry of the early planet, and in many ways engineering it to suit their needs. Our bodies…preserve the conditions of that early Earth. The chemical compounds within us, and especially our watery interiors, [are] a replication of the cozy primordial world the bacteria first evolved in. We are…perfectly designed bacteria vessels.” |
The Light Eaters gave me a profound understanding of how complex our plant cousins are. Not only do plants act to protect themselves against predators and try to maximize the odds for their offspring, research proves they also feel pain.
“To begin to include plants in our vision of the moving, living world, and see them as animate individuals in their own right, takes mental effort.”
I would argue that moving beyond outdated prejudices viewing plants as inert objects not only expands our spiritual appreciation of our animate world, it’s the only realistic approach to these incredible beings who make all life possible our planet.
“To begin to include plants in our vision of the moving, living world, and see them as animate individuals in their own right, takes mental effort.”
I would argue that moving beyond outdated prejudices viewing plants as inert objects not only expands our spiritual appreciation of our animate world, it’s the only realistic approach to these incredible beings who make all life possible our planet.
Read more excerpts from The Light Eaters and other wild plant-related factoids in Serving Plants
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