Old news, but this kind of ‘instinctual intelligence’ is intriguing…
Take the proficiency of fungi at problem-solving. Fungi are used to searching out food by exploring complex three-dimensional environments such as soil, so maybe it’s no surprise that fungal mycelium solves maze puzzles so accurately. It is also very good at finding the most economical route between points of interest. The mycologist Lynne Boddy once made a scale model of Britain out of soil, placing blocks of fungus-colonised wood at the points of the major cities; the blocks were sized proportionately to the places they represented. Mycelial networks quickly grew between the blocks: the web they created reproduced the pattern of the UK’s motorways (‘You could see the M5, M4, M1, M6’). Other researchers have set slime mould loose on tiny scale-models of Tokyo with food placed at the major hubs (in a single day they reproduced the form of the subway system) and on maps of Ikea (they found the exit, more efficiently than the scientists who set the task). Slime moulds are so good at this kind of puzzle that researchers are now using them to plan urban transport networks and fire-escape routes for large buildings.
Also, more old news, but the role fungus plays in forests is equally brilliant;
The implications of the Wood Wide Web far exceed this basic exchange of goods between plant and fungi, however. The fungal network also allows plants to distribute resources—sugar, nitrogen, and phosphorus—between one another. A dying tree might divest itself of its resources to the benefit of the community, for example, or a young seedling in a heavily shaded understory might be supported with extra resources by its stronger neighbors. Even more remarkably, the network also allows plants to send one another warnings. A plant under attack from aphids can indicate to a nearby plant that it should raise its defensive response before the aphids reach it. It has been known for some time that plants communicate above ground in comparable ways, by means of airborne hormones. But such warnings are more precise in terms of source and recipient when sent by means of the myco-net
Ideas are certain original forms of things, their archetypes, permanent and incommunicable, which are contained in the Divine intelligence. And though they neither begin to be nor cease, yet upon them are patterned the manifold things of the world that come into being and pass away.
St Augustine
Let me add this magnificent documentary on the above-ground biotic network of the African Fig Tree. It's a true masterpiece of storytelling and cinematography -- really worth contemplating. Full of an awesome wonder-and-terror, I have no idea how to reduce such a Great Mysteriousness to a philosophical model other than to surrender to the realization that any reduction will just present another idea. One can argue that this realization is a strong case for Idealism. Is Nature glorious or awful? Where-or-what is the defining unit of intelligence? My vote is both/and.
Yes there are some amazing organisms in nature. From the part of Africa I know well, you have Baobab trees that can literally save your life if you come across one when lost in the bush.
I’ve always liked Jane Goodall’s wonder at nature, and it’s great to see she has just won the Templeton prize;
Ideas are certain original forms of things, their archetypes, permanent and incommunicable, which are contained in the Divine intelligence. And though they neither begin to be nor cease, yet upon them are patterned the manifold things of the world that come into being and pass away.
St Augustine
The symbiosis between plants or between plants and animals is interesting. Usually in an idealistic worldview there is a tendency to see man as the crown of creation. Often the disadvantage of such a worldview is the reduction of M@L or of God - to those whose idealistic tendency is not atheistic - to the human mind.
Cooperation in the natural world indicates a disadvantage that has emerged with the development of human cognition, in detachment from the environment, while in bees, for example, one can assume a kind of a shared consciousness that allows for synchronized action.
"And a mute thought sails,
like a swift cloud on high.
Were I to ask, here below,
Amongst the gates of desolation:
Where goes
this captive of the heavens?
There is no one who can reveal to me the book,
or explain to me the chapters."
"Braiding Sweetgrass" by Robin Wall Kimmerer offers bridgeworks linking Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants, a must-read for anyone open to ecological sensibility.
"As a botanist, Robin Wall Kimmerer has been trained to ask questions of nature with the tools of science. As a member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, she embraces the notion that plants and animals are our oldest teachers. In Braiding Sweetgrass, Kimmerer brings these lenses of knowledge together to show that the awakening of a wider ecological consciousness requires the acknowledgment and celebration of our reciprocal relationship with the rest of the living world. For only when we can hear the languages of other beings are we capable of understanding the generosity of the earth, and learning to give our own gifts in return."
Be calm - Be clear - See the faults - See the suffering - Give your love
