What a Plant Knows: A Field Guide to the Senses by Daniel Chamovitz
patchy and abstract |
This
book has an inviting title and its slim size is easy reading. However it is poorly conceived, often requiring the reader to be familiar with some basic biology, yet not offering many insights beyond those such a reader would probably already know. Anecdote and example abound but these are fairly pedestrian, although they improve through the book, and while Chamowitz begs leave to indulge a degree of anthropomorphism, as the title demands, he spends a lot of time explaining human biology in order for the allegory to stick. Alas, there are better expositors of human biology. In fairness, he does a reasonable job but, again, most readers ready to understand the plant biology will become bored with the human elements being covered very superficially. Chamowitz acknowledges that plants do not see, smell, etc, in the way humans do. However, his descriptions remain a problem when he uses a generalised term rather than offering a clear explanation - for example when phytochrome `tells' plants that days are getting longer: in this example the reader is left to guess how this results in hormones promoting genetic coding of specific proteins which will result in plant growth. The continual cataloguing of plant `sensory' phenomena becomes a little like the stamp-collecting, disparaged by Rutherford, which takes the place of a deeper understanding. |
After
dealing with `seeing' in Chapter 1, `smelling' is covered in Chapter 2. Explanations about hormones are fairly simple, but it takes an unnecessarily long speed read to the point about plants `feeling' in Chapter 3. This chapter does get around to plant physiology and outlines some interesting phenomena. I was left wondering about the outcome of Bowles's experiments regarding electric innervations in tomato plants. Chapters 4 and 5 introduce more examples on plants `hearing' and `knowing where they are', and the treatment of human biology is interesting and key to extending the comparison with plants. Chapter 6 details various environmental and epigenetic responses which could be characterised as 'memory'. This chapter moves onto the epilogue which extends the awareness metaphor painfully into a consideration of plant intelligence. This abstract conjecture generally derides itself and is of marginal philosophical relevance. |