Plants 'Recognize' Their Siblings

An anonymous reader writes to tell us that according to a recent study, Biologists have found that plants are able to recognize their own relatives. "Researchers at McMaster University have found that plants get fiercely competitive when forced to share their pot with strangers of the same species, but they're accommodating when potted with their siblings. [...] Though they lack cognition and memory, the study shows plants are capable of complex social behaviours such as altruism towards relatives, says Dudley. Like humans, the most interesting behaviours occur beneath the surface."

Re:Or...

[illegalcortex]

Not sure this is any different than any other form of sibling recognition...

Cognition isn't the right concept

[digitalderbs]

Disclaimer : I'm not a plant biologist. I'm a physical biochemist.

The process of biochemically detecting neighboring organisms is not new. Bacteria use quorum sensing [wikipedia.org] biochemical pathways to "communicate" various things about environment such as population density -- molecules are exchanged and recognized in the extracellular environment.

What is interesting here is that presummably there are different signals for siblings and non-siblings. A more interesting result, in my opinion, would be to find the biochemical connection to this selective quorum sensing. The answer could be complicated : it could include libraries of biochemicals (in varying concentrations) and differences in bacterial flora between plants.

Re: Reading way too much into this...

[mollog]

I had the same thought (reading way too much into this). Perhaps roots of related plants are toxic to each other and that's why the roots don't spread. Roots of unrelated plants are not toxic to each other. This could be an evolutionary adaptation that encourages cross-breeding of unrelated plants.

Regardless, there are a number of possible reasons for the effect.

Drought Tolerance

[mdsolar]

More deeply rooted plants are more resistant to drought. I wonder if it would make sense to do a sacrificial second sowing with a different batch of seeds to encourage root development as a hedge against drought?
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Rent solar power with no maintenance fee: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-users -selling-solar.html [blogspot.com]

Re:Or...

[Andrew Kismet]

Plants are highly immobile, and food for both both dogs and humans. Don't anthropomorphise species which are not human, especially not within a scientific context like this. It's actually quite likely that plants treat 'sibling' plants as an extension of themselves; it's a highly logical adaptation. Instead of being two separate plants, they are two growths of the same plant, and thus do not compete, as fighting with that which is yourself (read: more or less the same DNA) is futile and does not further propagation of the genetic code. The reason animals fight is due to the vast genetic variation between siblings; also for purposes of entertainment and education. Even twins will fight in species with developed brains, for then memetic influence becomes key on top of genetic influence.

Disclaimer, I have been reading far too much Dawkins, I am not a biologist

Re:Drought Tolerance

[TranscendentalAnarch]

Perhaps something a little less wasteful would be mixing whatever chemical/compound is signaling this behavior into the soil.

ignoratio elenchi

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't even mention that plants can feel pain. What are the vegans going to eat?

I have read the articles written making this claim, and examined the evidence presented. It is not even remotely compelling.

The whole of the argument was this:

1) Things that respond to injury feel pain.
2) Plants respond to injury.
3) Therefore plants feel pain.

Premise 1 has been experimentally disproven. There are many tissues in the body which humans do not feel and that heal when injured. There are cases of humans born with malformed nervous systems such that they cannot feel pain, and yet their limbs heal. Surgical removal of parts of the nervous system was performed on some animals, and their tissues healed just fine afterwords. The ability to respond to injury is not a sufficient condition of the ability to feel pain.

Furthermore, "feeling pain" is defined in terms of a chain of events within a central nervous system. Plants don't have one.

The whole concept seems to have came around just to piss off a bunch of vegetarians and try to provide some weird moral justification for eating meat (as if a moral justification was needed). The implied argument was to the effect of: if plants feel pain, and it is okay to eat them, then it is okay to eat anything that feels pain (ever heard of a "dicto simplicter" fallacy?).

So, in sum, the best biological information we have to date clearly indicates that plants do not feel pain (but they do respond to injury).

Re:Or...

[shaitand]

Of course. You don't think your 'self' is actually one thing do you? Even the neurons that together culminate in your conscious mind are actually a bunch of completely independent pieces.

The closer an organism is to your genetics the closer the instinctual bond. Parents, Children, brothers, and sisters. Then extended family and finally other humans. Then other lifeforms that are most similar to humans, mammals before reptiles and fish, animals before plants, and even plants are closer and therefore more sacred than micro-organisms. Do you actually think one form of life is innately superior to another? Of course not, we just view those that are closer to ourselves as superior.

Re:Or...

[illegalcortex]

I think it will become much clearer to you if you think in terms of genes, not organisms. It's not the "plant" that "recognizes" siblings, it's individual cells of the plants that behave according to an underlying set of genes. You are stuck on the "higher level" stuff like "thinking" and "smelling" without asking why those complex behaviors might have arisen and what is actually in the driver's seat.

You may think that's there's a big difference between the plant not trying to out-compete its sibling and a human being helping their sibling. But that's just because you're being confused by the window dressing.

Re:ignoratio elenchi

[Ucklak]

They [plants] also have a rectangular cellular makeup and I'm sure their nervous system is nothing like us animals. They respond to stimuli like a mouse thinks "oh sh*t" when an owl or snake gulps him down. What's really cool about plants is that they make their own food. Stuff that decays near their roots is just dessert. It's a shame that humans aren't as efficient.

If you have an alligator that tears a leg off a zebra, that zebra will still try to hobble away in order to survive.
Likewise, you can tear a weed or a plant bud off the parent plant and it will try to grow on its own. That plant knows that something isn't right and it needs to adapt in order to survive.

Just because it isn't able to scream doesn't mean it doesn't feel pain. The fact it doesn't scream makes vegans feel better.
Vegans are about 50/50 in the health benefit [good for you] versus "think of the animals" [shut the hell up]. The latter are the annoying crowd that seem to represent the vegan population and may not neccessessarily be true. When I see snakes eating watermelons and tofu, I'll think about cutting meat out my diet.

Re:Or...

[Reality Master 101]

Where's your ethical cutoff point? Why?

I eat what's appealing, same as every other animal. Do I need another reason?

Frankly, I'm very comfortable with my place in the food chain. Nature is... natural.

Re:Or...

[fitten]

You're right. I do have my own set of ethics governing what I eat, but as I said, I feel no reason to justify them to you or anyone else. As long as I'm not doing anything illegal, and more importantly, affecting *you*... why do you care?

Other than that, your 'conclusions' about me are... well... let's just say uninformed.