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Plant perception (paranormal)

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Cleve Backster in 1969, a notable proponent of paranormal plant perception
This article is about theories regarding paranormal emotion and perception in plants. For the physiology of normal perception in multicellular plants, see Plant perception (physiology).

Plant perception or biocommunication is the paranormal idea that plants are sentient, that they feel pain, that they respond to humans in a manner that amounts to ESP, and that they experience a range of emotions or parapsychological states. Since plants lack nervous systems,[1][2][3][4] paranormal claims regarding plant perception are considered pseudoscience by the scientific community.[1][2][5][6]

Such paranormal claims are distinct from the ability of plants to sense and respond to the environment via chemical and related stimuli.

Research

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In the 1960s Cleve Backster, an interrogation specialist with the CIA, conducted research that led him to believe that plants can communicate with other lifeforms. Backster's interest in the subject began in February 1966 when he tried to measure the rate at which water rises from a philodendron's root into its leaves. Because a polygraph or "lie detector" can measure electrical resistance, which would alter when the plant was watered, he attached a polygraph to one of the plant's leaves. Backster stated that, to his immense surprise, "the tracing began to show a pattern typical of the response you get when you subject a human to emotional stimulation of short duration".[7]

In 1975, K. A. Horowitz, D. C. Lewis and E. L. Gasteiger published an article in Science giving their results when repeating one of Backster's effects – plant response to the killing of brine shrimp in boiling water. The researchers grounded the plants to reduce electrical interference and rinsed them to remove dust particles. As a control, three of five pipettes contained brine shrimp while the remaining two only had water; the pipettes were delivered to the boiling water at random. This investigation used a total of 60 brine shrimp deliveries to boiling water while Backster's had used 13. Positive correlations did not occur at a rate great enough to be considered statistically significant.[8] Other controlled experiments that attempted to replicate Backster's findings have also produced negative results.[1][9][10][11]

Botanist Arthur Galston and physiologist Clifford L. Slayman who investigated Backster's claims wrote:

There is no objective scientific evidence for the existence of such complex behaviour in plants. The recent spate of popular literature on "plant consciousness" appears to have been triggered by "experiments" with a lie detector, subsequently reported and embellished in a book called The Secret Life of Plants. Unfortunately, when scientists in the discipline of plant physiology attempted to repeat the experiments, using either identical or improved equipment, the results were uniformly negative. Further investigation has shown that the original observations probably arose from defective measuring procedures.[1]

John M. Kmetz noted that Backster had not used proper controls in his experiments. When controls were used, no plant reactions to thoughts or threats were observed.[12]

The television show MythBusters also performed experiments (Season 4, Episode 18, 2006) to verify or disprove the concept. The tests involved connecting plants to a polygraph galvanometer and employing actual and imagined harm upon the plants or upon others in the plants' vicinity. The galvanometer showed a reaction about one third of the time. The experimenters, who were in the room with the plant, posited that the vibrations of their actions or the room itself could have affected the polygraph. After isolating the plant, the polygraph showed a response slightly less than one third of the time. Later experiments with an EEG failed to detect anything. The show concluded that the results were not repeatable, and that the theory was not true.[13]

Jainism

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The idea that plants can feel is also found in Jainism. Jains believe that souls called Jīvas subject to the cycle of birth and death inhabit plants, but are considered one-sensed beings classed as ekendriya which only have the sense of touch.[14]

Manichaeism

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The Cologne Mani Codex contains stories showing that Manichaeans believed in the existence of sentient plant souls. Manichaean beliefs in the existence of plant souls likely originated from Jain ideas.[15]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ a b c d Galston, Arthur W; Slayman, Clifford L. Plant Sensitivity and Sensation. In George Ogden Abell, Barry Singer. (1981). Science and the Paranormal: Probing the Existence of the Supernatural. Junction Books. pp. 40-55. ISBN 0-86245-037-3
  2. ^ a b "Plant perception (a.k.a. the Backster effect) - The Skeptic's Dictionary". Skepdic.com. Retrieved 2012-03-21.
  3. ^ Tittle, Peg. (2011). Critical Thinking: An Appeal to Reason. Routledge. p. 317. ISBN 0-203-84161-1
  4. ^ Jong, Tom de; Klinkhamer, Peter. (2005). Evolutionary Ecology of Plant Reproductive Strategies. Cambridge University Press. p. 2. ISBN 0-521-82142-8 "Plants do not have a nervous system and certainly do not make conscious decisions about what to do next."
  5. ^ Audus, Leslie. (1974). Roots of Absurdity. New Scientist. 17 October. p. 207
  6. ^ Galston, Arthur W; Slayman, Clifford L. (1979). The Not-So-Secret Life of Plants: In Which the Historical and Experimental Myths About Emotional Communication Between Animal and Vegetable Are Put to Rest. American Scientist 67 (3): 337-344.
  7. ^ Backster, Cleve. (2003). Primary Perception: Biocommunication with Plants, Living Foods, and Human Cells. White Rose Millennium Press. ISBN 978-0966435436
  8. ^ Horowitz, K. A., Lewis, D. C, and Gasteiger, E. L. (1975). Plant Primary Perception: Electrophysiological Unresponsiveness to Brine Shrimp Killing. Science 189: 478-480.
  9. ^ Schwebs, Ursula. (1973). Do Plants Have Feelings? Harpers. pp. 75-76
  10. ^ Chedd, Graham. (1975). AAAS takes on Emotional Plants. New Scientist. 13 February. pp. 400-401
  11. ^ Neher, Andrew. (2011). Paranormal and Transcendental Experience: A Psychological Examination. Dover Publications. pp. 155-156. ISBN 978-0486261676
  12. ^ Kmetz, John M. (1978). Plant Primary Perception: The Other Side of the Leaf. Skeptical Inquirer 2 (2): 57-61.
  13. ^ "Episode 61: Deadly Straw, Primary Perception". Annotated Mythbusters. September 6, 2006.
  14. ^ "The Soul". BBC. 2009-09-10.
  15. ^ Fynes, Richard C.C. (1996). "Plant Souls in Jainism and Manichaeism The Case for Cultural Transmission". East and West. 46 (1/2). Istituto Italiano per l'Africa e l'Oriente (IsIAO): 21–44. ISSN 0012-8376. JSTOR 29757253.

Further reading

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