brimstoneSalad wrote: ↑Fri Oct 16, 2020 11:57 am
@plant You are in violation of forum rules. You need to answer the
questions others are asking of you, that's typically how debate progresses, not by repeating the claims you have already made.
I already explained repeatedly: I did answer, but perhaps the answer wasn't to your liking. I want to be clear: this topic isn't about me or to question veganism. Therefor some of the questions were irellevant.
This topic is started by me, as such I have a certain eligibility to determine the subject of the discussion. I have made it very clear that I did NOT want that the subject of the discussion was turned onto me.
I have been suspected and accussed of lots of things during the short duration of this topic. An example:
brimstoneSalad wrote: ↑Mon Oct 12, 2020 1:43 pm
@plant If you are using a proxy to hide your IP address, that may be another reason your post was flagged as spam.
I'll just say that when an anonymous person has the same views as and references an obscure contemporary philosopher (like Michael Marder) that person usually turns out to BE that obscure contemporary philosopher. If that's the case, then you may also be afoul of the no-self-promotion guidelines, particularly if you're doing it anonymously under the guise of a third person recommending your own work (which has some seriously troubling ethical ramifications). If you are Michael Marder it would be appropriate to say so and apologize for the deception.
It is evidence of a certain intent or defensive attitude in which the goal is to attack or undermine me - the messenger - in an attempt to discredit the information. I have seen such behaviour before, with people who were unable to use sound reasoning to defend their idea's. It is a lowly tactic in my opinion.
My responses have been sincere and I did answer the questions while in the same time steering the topic away from a potential turning of the subject onto me - the messenger.
brimstoneSalad wrote: ↑Fri Oct 16, 2020 11:57 amMost people working under "plant neurobiology" are self evident quacks who are promoting spiritual beliefs and not doing science. You see a lot of work claiming plants are psychic and can read minds or have feelings. Yes there is some credible research in
signaling that is being grouped under that, but doesn't apply to "neurobiology" because such does not exist in plants and those researchers know it.
You can not interpret a
misnomer as evidence of the thing it is misrepresenting.
Signaling is responded to by ordinary cells through chemicals that alter gene expression. Plant cells don't operate as logic gates and they do not express associative learning -- they are not sentient or conscious in any meaningful sense of the words as we apply them to animals. The little credible research there is is interesting stuff, but it is not neurobiology, it's not a brain, and it doesn't support your claims in the slightest.
At the very *best* some root behavior resembles that of the simplest worms, just on a much slower time-scale, but there is still no evidence that such animal worms are even sentient so that behavioral correlation doesn't tell us anything that we don't know -- that there's even less reason to believe plants are sentient than worms that we already don't believe to be sentient.
plant wrote: ↑Fri Oct 16, 2020 5:15 amThose "few professors" cannot be tossed aside that easily as if they are some spiritually motivated individuals.
Most of them are, and it's bad science AKA pseudoscience.
plant wrote: ↑Fri Oct 16, 2020 5:15 amThe mentioned professors and researchers are increasingly receiving credible mainstream media attention.
Yellow journalism isn't evidence of anything. Do you believe everything you see on Fox news too?
Again, clearly, you attack the messenger in attempt to provide a basis for your conviction that plants are not sentient.
As an example, you name the cited media as Yellow journalism and ask wether I would believe anything from Fox news. The first cited article in the OP is from BBC and there are many articles from science magazines and direct links to published research.
A professor who studied plant behaviour for 4 decades argues that plants are in fact "slow animals" that can feel, see, listen and respond. It doesn't seem to be just to call him a quack or BBC Yellow journalism for giving the perspective of the professor credible coverage.
You are correct that you cannot simply believe anything from the media. However, when a subject in the media is considered 'in general' one can derive some worthy insights from it. When publishers such as BBC or science magazines give credible attention to professors that claim that plants are social and intelligent creatures that are capable of 'friendship' with animals, then as such that information can provide a sound basis for consideration (without the need to believe anything).
Again: the cited articles in the OP were not intended to
prove that plant sentience is a fact, they were provided to make a case that the mere plausibility of the consideration of plant morality is evident, by which one cannot argue - like you do - that the non existence of plant sentience is an undisputed fact in the status quo of science.
With regard to plant neurobiology being quackery. I do not believe that such a conviction or attitude is applicable and just. It appears that a lot is yet unknown about plants. It was only recently discovered that cells at the tips of the hairs on the roots of plants function similarly as brain neurons in animals.
NIH.GOV:
From Nerve Roots to Plant Roots
Sprouting. Branching. Pruning. Neuroscientists have borrowed heavily from botanists to describe the way that neurons grow, but analogies between the growth of neurons and plants may be more than superficial. A new study from the National Institutes of Health and Harvard Medical School suggests that neurons and plant root cells may grow using a similar mechanism.
https://www.nih.gov/news-events/news-re ... paraplegia
It is not evidence for plant sentience but it is certainly something that may be worthy of consideration and further research (i.e., it would not be just to call scientists who investigate it and who provide theories for it's purpose, quacks).
With regard to the subject of the topic: the precense of neurochemicals in plants was discovered fairly recently. Perhaps it is purposeless, as you say. But perhaps it isn't. In my opinion the fact that the discoveries are fairly recent would demand a humble attitude to what may be possible to discover.
The fact that the discoveries are recent may be a hint that plant sentience - something that we cannot conceive of with today's knowledge - may be possible. If you would truly be capable of caring for sentient beings, would you not (in retrospective) want to have done what you could to discover it in plants so that you could have provided sufficient care?
With regard the interest of humanity. It may be essential that humans will have been capable of discovering plant sentience if it exists, to even consider forging a fruitful, i.e. friendly, relation with alien species, if the goal is to prevent survival to be subject to mere random chance or 'luck'.
If friendship is possible, at quest would be: what would be its purpose and what would it require?
To return to the subject of the topic: The issue that this topic intends to address is that the information that indicates that plant sentience may be possible, may be principally suppressed and ignored, which could cause a problem if in fact plants are later to be proven to have been sentient creatures.
I have seen no evidence that justifies the claim that Plant Neurobiology is quackery and that the idea that plants could be sentient creatures can be tossed aside as nonsense.