Connections in Plants Have Created a Cooperative Environment

We would not survive without the symbiotic nature of plants. In a healthy ecosystem, the roots of plants are connected by fungi to provide nutrients and warn for danger, keeping the entire system alive. They rely on these connections to sustain themselves, allowing people to thrive from the oxygen, food, and medicine they provide us.

The interdependence of plants has behavior that we view as altruism in people, giving to those in need, without a gain for the act. Even though plants lack a consciousness, in both plants and people, actions are the basis for defining an act of kindness. Humans can say they feel empathy, but its what they do to prove it that really matters. Plants have shown levels of intelligence and caring behavior through their actions, displaying what we call empathy in people.

The main connection of roots comes from fungi. Mushrooms create a “mycorrhizal network,” described in the National Forest Foundation article, “Underground Network: The Amazing Connections Beneath Your Feet.” The mushrooms survive underground by connecting to the roots of nearby trees. They are fueled by the carbon and sugar, made by photosynthesis, from the trees, and, in return, supply the trees with minerals needed to survive.

Author Britt Holewinski explains that trees use this link to connect with other trees as well. Trees that are lacking proper nutrients can send distress signals, allowing healthy trees to respond and send resources like carbon, water, and minerals to them. The mushrooms can benefit as well, taking a percentage of nutrients sent in these exchanges. Younger tree saplings profit from this link often, as Holewinski explains:

For saplings growing in particularly shady areas, there is not enough sunlight reaching their leaves to perform adequate photosynthesis. For survival, the sapling relies on nutrients and sugar from older, taller trees sent through the mycorrhizal network.”

As the saplings have nothing to provide for the full grown tree, the act appears to be selfless. The saplings without proper resources send distress signals to alert others of their unhealthy state, and healthy trees can immediately respond. It’s an incredibly helpful link. The well sustained trees have no other reason besides a helping hand to send support to the sapling. The idea is very endearing, picturing how nature works together.

The distress signals sent by plants seem to be selfless acts, too. Distress signals sent by plants is explained in more detail by Hirokazu Ueda in the journal, Plant Communication: Mediated by individual or blended vocs? The authors studied “volatile organic compounds,” defined as “airborne signals.” They can be used for a range of reasons, such as attracting pollinators or alerting nearby plants of incoming danger. The plants alerted of the danger can prepare for consequences, increasing the production of defensive chemicals.

After analyzing plant’s capacity to alert for danger and transfer resources, the plants sending information or nutrients have very little benefit for themselves. A plant that provides minerals to a plant in need has no gain, just as the plant alerting for danger has no benefit for themselves. In the far future they may be able to have an equal exchange of resources, yet there is no mutual benefit in the moment. In humans, this kind of selfless act is related to empathy. Behavior displaying generosity for someone in danger or a state of distress is an emotional response. It begs the question of what plants are capable of.

Plant intelligence is explored in “New Research on Plant Intelligence may forever change how you think about plants,” from The World. The author explains the findings of researcher and animal biologist, Monica Gagliano. She studied the mimosa pudica plant, a fern-like plant that closes it’s leaves when it senses contact. Gagliano repeatedly dropped the plant without harming it. At first, it would close on impact. After a few more falls, the plant would stop responding to being dropped. She shook the plant to see if it simply stopped reacting to any danger, yet it closed at this action. Weeks later, she repeated the dropping action again and the plant still refused to close.

The researcher concluded that the plant had a learning ability, a sign of intelligence required for an emotional capacity. It remembered that falling would not harm it, and stopped reacting to the action. Other forms of contact still triggered it to respond, so it must have learned that it was specifically safe when Gagliano dropped the plant. The author related this learning capacity to signs of intelligence. Even without neurons, they show behavior that is linked to processing information, remembering the information, and enacting it. It’s a learned response.

Plant intelligence and memory introduces a new perspective on their capabilities. Furthermore, the idea is another similarity to humans. It takes a level of intelligence to care for another being. Along with a plant’s selfless behavior, it appears to be so shockingly similar to people. It could be possible for plants to remember their own distress in the past, and reflect it on the current situations of their neighboring species.

Moreover, an individual plant may not have a brain, although, the entire system is strikingly like a human neural system. Suzanne Simard, author of Finding the Mother Tree, shares her findings from many her explorations, focused on studying the connections of plants. Her biggest finding was about Douglas-fir trees, or “Mother Trees.” Without the Mother Trees, the entire ecosystem would collapse. Their roots are a large source of nutrients for the surrounding environment. It’s the network it creates that is truly incredible. Simard says during one expedition:

I made a map, Mother Trees, saplings, seedlings. Lines sketched between them. Emerging from my drawing was a pattern like a neural network, like the neurons in our brain, with some nodes more highly linked than others. Holy smokes. If the mycorrhizal network is a facsimile of a neural network, the molecules moving among the trees were like neurotransmitters.

Simard continues to debate the abilities of plants after making the astounding discovery. She wonders of the limit of their intelligence, and how identical the network really is to the human brain. It opens a world of new questions and possibilities waiting to be discovered. With such an identical similarity, it’s possible the entire system could reach certain capacities of a human brain.

The behavior of plants and their potential for higher intelligence is in line with what people define as empathy. As bizarre as it sounds, plants match the characteristics we see as having empathy in humans. They each learn from past experiences and have a system of processing and sharing information, communicating what they learn. Both plant and human display acts of selflessness, sharing resources when they find one of their kind in harm. In both humans and plants, connections are used for the survival of the community. They help each other in order to have a thriving environment.

Furthermore, plants use this link to increase their rates of survival, and humans use their connections to improve life as well. We care about people for the survival of our loved ones and community, whether it’s conscious or not. Helping one another is a skill to defend our species against sickness and dangers in our society. That mentality can profit to the person sharing compassion, hoping it benefits them in the long run, with others having their back when they need it. Plants are not much different in their generous ways of life.

References

Holewinski, B. (n.d.). Underground networking: The amazing connections beneath your feet. National Forest Foundation. Retrieved 13 October 2022.

Ueda, H., Kikuta, Y., & Matsuda, K. (2012, February 1). Plant Communication: Mediated by individual or blended vocs? Plant signaling & behavior. Retrieved November 7, 2022

New Research on Plant Intelligence may forever change how you think about plants. The World from PRX. (2014, January 10). Retrieved November 7, 2022

Simard, S. (2022). Finding the mother tree. Random House US.