NOTE: this is the opening of the 2nd chapter of our Yoga Psychology book. This was an extremely interesting section to write. First, we set ourselves the task of writing about only those things that would be acceptable within the current scientific mainstream, while still trying to push the boundaries – at least somewhat. One of the many interesting things that came out of doing this is seeing how fast the “scientific mainstream” changes. At the time I started the research – in 2000 – there was still a great deal of skepticism about whether any animal had what we call “consciousness”. Now, just 14 years later, panpsychism – the idea that consciousness is an essential component of ALL matter – is almost starting to be acceptable in mainstream circles. Still, Dyson’s speculation about “mind” being “inherent in every atom” is still pretty far “out there.” And back then, in 2000, it was very difficult to find any mainstream scientist willing to talk about consciousness in primitive organisms.
For those not familiar with the philosophers of mind, Churchland is particularly famous for being an “eliminative materialist” – that is, he would like to dispense with any talk of “consciousness” whatsoever. He predicted back in the 80s that people would use brain language instead of “mind” language. I ridiculed this attitude for a long time, and now I’m celebrating 5 year old children who talk about the need to develop their “mid prefrontal cortex” in order to have more control over their “amygdala”!!!
By the way, the studies of Trewawas and Nakagaki were great finds. The plant intelligence information is really amazing to me; Jeremy Narby also has a great book on intelligence in plants and “primitive” animals, and Rich Doyle has a wonderful book, “Darwin’s Pharmacy”, on plant intelligence. And isn’t Nakagaki’s title wonderful??!
Notice also in the first footnote, we’re being cautious about the word “consciousness.” I didn’t realize when I started working on the book how many different ways the word is used and how heated the arguments have become about which one is “right” and which ones are ‘wrong’. And that’s all about controversies in science and philosophy. Since this is on a site about Indian psychology, I should mention that to many – particularly the Advaita Vedantins – the whole idea of the evolution of consciousness is highly suspect. If you want to see someone become positively apoplectic at the mention of evolution, do a search for “Seyyed Hossein Nasr” and “Aurobindo”. Truly amazing:>))
Finally, a note about one moment of writing. I actually remember the afternoon Jan and I were writing. For some reason, we were having a little fun with alliteration, and I think we sat around for quite awhile playing with words that began in “S”, and finally came up with shrub, slime mold, snowy owl and South American sea lion. I think we were worried the heated arguments about evolution and consciousness might make things too serious, so we thought a little playfulness was in order.
THE STORY OF THE EVOLUTION OF CONSCIOUSNESS
When did consciousness first appear?
Some say consciousness was there at the beginning, and exists throughout the universe. Physicist Freeman Dyson, describing the mysterious discoveries of quantum physics, writes “[a]toms are weird stuff, behaving like active agents rather than inert substances. They make unpredictable choices between alternative possibilities according to the laws of quantum mechanics. It appears that mind, as manifested by the capacity to make choices, is to some extent inherent in every atom.”[i] In contrast, others like psychologist Susan Blackmore and philosopher Paul Churchland advise us to be realistic and face the fact that consciousness does not really exist anywhere, that it is nothing more than a word that describes a particular activity of the brain. Apart from these two extremes, most scientists agree that consciousness does in fact exist, but disagree about when it first appeared.[1] In the last decade, as scientists havehad access to more sophisticated tools for investigating intelligence, it has become possible to detect intelligent behavior much earlier in the evolutionary chain.
According to Anthony Trewavas, professor of biology at the University of Edinburgh, “plants have senses and can detect a wide variety of external variables, such as light, water, temperature, chemicals, vibrations, gravity, and sounds. They can also react to these factors by changing the way they grow. Plants can forage and compete with one another for resources. When attacked by herbivores, some plants signal for help, releasing chemicals that attract their assailants’ predators. Plants can detect distress signals let off by other plant species and take preventive measures. They can assimilate information and respond on the whole-plant level. And they use cell-to-cell communication based on molecular and electrical signals, some of which are remarkably similar to those used by our own neurons. When a plant is damaged, its cells send one another electrical signals just like our own pain messages.”[ii]
Trewavas does not claim that plants can think or have anything resembling human self-awareness. However, he does consider these facts about plants to be a clear demonstration that they are sentient and respond intelligently to what they sense.
Toshiyuki Nakagaki is an associate professor of biology at Hokkaido University in Sapporo, Japan. In articles such as Amoeboid Organisms May Be More Clever Than We Had Thought, Nakagaki describessome remarkable abilities in the organism known as the “true slime mold” – a creature formed by the merging together of thousands of amoebae into a single cell. Though it does not have eyes or a nervous system, it is able to “move, navigate and avoid obstacles. [It] can also sense food at a distance and head unerringly toward it.”[iii]
When researchers place separate pieces of a true slime mold into a maze, the pieces rejoin to form a single organism that spreads out into every corridor of the maze, covering all the available space. “[W]hen food is placed at the start and end points of the maze, the slime mold withdraws from the dead-end corridors and shrinks its body to a tube spanning the shortest path between food sources …[and it] solves the maze in this way each time it is tested.” Nakagaki and his collaborators conclude “[t]his remarkable process of cellular computation implies that cellular materials can show a primitive intelligence.” [iv]
Some may be reluctant to consider the possibility that the activity of such primitive organisms reflects any kind of conscious intelligence. If, however, one is willing to concede that a shrub or slime mold possesses some form of intelligence, it seems hard to dispute that it is probably less complex than that of a snowy owl or a South American sea lion. Nevertheless, the idea that consciousness has somehow grown in complexity over the course of evolution continues to be very controversial.
[1] There is a wide range of positions amongst scientists regarding the nature of consciousness. For example, some, like Trewavas and Nakagaki, who see evidence of the workings of intelligence in one-celled organisms, might not see this as evidence that a paramecium or pomegranate has any kind of subjective experience (i.e., feelings). On the other hand, there are some (e.g., psychologist Harry Hunt) who believe there is evidence for subjectivity even in primitive organisms. There are very few who would assert that either intelligence or subjective experience is anything more than a complex working of matter. In this chapter, we’re using the word “consciousness” to include both subjective experience and intelligence. For now, the term is intended to be entirely neutral with regard to whether or not consciousness can be explained as a purely material phenomenon.