I am writing this because we are all pretty tied up in knots over the various aspects of geopolitics, geoeconomics, and the climate crisis. Without avoiding these very serious concerns, I think there are different places we can put ourselves in life which will give us different perspectives on what the most profound aspects of life really are. Doing this may calm us, and afford us the energy and perspective to meet the troubling matters head-on, in much in the way a real vacation can recharge our batteries and enhance our ability to meet normal days.
Giving these, as described in the cited books, due consideration (and reconsideration) will help us develop “a quiet eye” https://uponreconsidering.blog/2023/02/03/the-quiet-eye/ and avoid crippling anxiety.
In the books cited below, information is relatively new, because scientists can now observe more animals in the wild, and can attach to them devices to measure different bodily functions and abilities. This very recent research into the other inhabitants of this earth, leads us to question whether some of the things we think we uniquely can do, can be done by other creatures even with no brain or central nervous system. We learn more about how other animals, and bacteria and insects, and now plants, behave. Words in quotes may imply that thought, planning, intent, and intelligence would normally be inferred, but this is a philosophical matter. I invite you to think carefully about how to regard the identified abilities.
The stories are not only about what we have learned about the rest of life, but also about our new ability to learn these new things. I’m unsure which is the more amazing story.
So here are examples of changes in my sense of place in the scheme of things, as a result of reading these books.
Dogs and time:
When I walk the dog and become impatient at the long time she spends sniffing one place, or moving from that place some distance still sniffing, not encountering anything I see, I remind myself that she is living in a different time than I: she can tell not only who has been there, but how long ago; she can sense where that one came from or went to either very recently or several days ago. She experiences history as a normal part of her day. She may also smell things far below ground, of which I have no inkling. She may stay there to learn more, whether or not she digs (which I don’t allow).
Birds, imitations, and speed of living:
There are birds which can imitate other birds’ and other species’ calls in order to deceive predators and attract prey and sexual partners. Birds which we used to think made amazing long flights across oceans without stopping or landing anywhere, do land in open water to rest. Some can even shift remaining fat from storage areas in their bodies to other more aerodynamic places while flying. (Wish I could shift some body fat that way!)
When looking out over our front garden, I spot birds on the ground. It appears that they move quickly, jerkily, and I’ve often wondered why. Now I know that video recordings of some species show that I can not perceive the full motion at these times: they can be doing several additional things which I do not perceive, leaving me with the impression of jerky motion. One example was a video of birds courting, in which they do full 360 degree summersaults as part of the ritual. The human eye misses these things, but the female being courted does not. The males also display colours which we do not perceive, but the female does. More examples of the many things going on around me of which I am altogether unaware.
Astonishingly specific pollinating:
As I look at our flower gardens and appreciate my wife’s efforts to encourage pollinators, I now am aware that some flowers use their colours and scents to attract specific birds and insects. Some are very specialized, and are arranged so that pollen can be captured by only very specific birds; some also repel undesired pollinators. There is much more “strategizing” going around me that I had perceived in earlier days.
Plants’ intentions:
At an outdoor concert recently in Niagara-on-the-Lake, the performance area was a tented concrete slab in a large lawn, surrounded by pear, apple, and peach trees. While I awaited the performance, I observed the gathering audience and performers, but also wondered about the trees’ heights: perhaps their heights are partly the results of growers’ decisions about when to prune to channel the growth energy into fruit production rather than further growth (although some are grafted); but it is also a result of how the trees’ seeds are “meant” to be scattered. Does the tree depend primarily on wind, or small animals to eat the fruit and scatter the seeds wherever else it goes, or upon birds to do it? Does it require being close to the earth to have its fruit eaten by non-climbing animals, or is height to its advantage?
When in a forest, I consider the heights of the older, taller trees and the distances between them and their progeny and other trees: has there been “competition” among them for access to the sun? Have they suppressed the younger trees and kept them in shade as part of the competition? Are they near other trees to share the nutrition, water, and information and health-preserving chemicals they need to thrive? Have the oak trees limited their seed production a while because rodents have eaten too many, and so must be forced to go elsewhere for food? Are they producing much seed now because that “strategy” worked, the rodents are away, and the oaks are now free to spawn?
The neurological effects of being in nature:
I deliberately and routinely seek time in nature. I am fortunate to live near a large lake, a huge forest, near several creeks with small forests in my neighbourhood, and in a suburb where trees along the streets and in our back yards, and of course our flower gardens, are plentiful. Here I can calm my directed attention and substitute soft fascination. I to be less anxious after a while, and will improve my ability to think. There is much behind this, see below1.
Broad and deep effects of the climate crisis:
As I looked out this summer at orange, smoky sky, I resolved to take much more seriously (that would be very seriously indeed) the problems of forest fires. I am very aware not only of the potential damage to my lungs and heart, but also neurological processes. I am aware that many of these fires are the result of almost always on-going subterranean fires caused by fires so hot they literally scorched the earth and burned scrub and carbon products beneath the ground. I am glad we have had the right amount of rain in my area, because I am next to the largest urban forest in North America, the Rouge Park. Were it to dry as so often happens elsewhere during extreme droughts, and catch on fire, the threat to me and my family and community would be huge. I am also aware that methane, the most powerful of carbon gases, is being released not only by things that burn, but by decay of things that burned long ago, and by decomposition of things in wetlands (I live by Lake Ontario). Does this provoke anxiety? No, but it does provoke awareness. It affects my behaviour, including donations to help people who have been driven out of their homes and communities north and west of here.
We are less alone than we realize:
When humankind in the west hemisphere start migrating north of the equator, and populate mainly southern Canada to get away from the heat to the south, others will come along with us, regardless of whether we intend that. There are animals which have evolved along with us, either simply traveling parallel, or benefiting from being with us (sheep totally depend upon us, others are simply used life is with us – dogs, rats, cats, horses, cattle.) And others are essential to us and we to them – some bacteria (particularly in our guts) and part of the environment where we live, on our skin, in the food we eat. They will travel with us, and so will undesirable viruses and other bacteria, along with some diseases we have not encountered locally now. Some trees and other plants will migrate also, along with all the underground communication and nurturing systems they have now.
Relocating “civilization” may be good for us:
What we now think of as the northern limits of our potential migration (because of cold) may have changed by the time we arrive, partly because the warming climate will have melted more permafrost, and partly because the beavers are already in the Arctic, breaking up ice and developing ponds, thereby attracting other plants, moss, insects, bacteria, and so forth. So perhaps the north might be more welcoming, although the loss of so much ice will be a problem as will the resulting methane. Perhaps we will not be too crowded there, and we will not have such problems with density — most current countries’ birthrates are not replacing the populations, and probably more of the remaining population will be older. Dense populations of people’ being forced to live together, usually brings frustration, strong disagreement, and violence (especially where it is still hot or hotter), so less density would help. (Perhaps you don’t see this as a cheery thought, but sometimes recognizing the good that comes along with the bad can be beneficial.)
Understanding these new things puts me into a whole different place in life. I enjoy it.
Sources for the above:
Becoming Earth: How Our Planet Came to Life by Ferris Jabr. Our planet became alive, and its basic rock and mineral components were changed, because of deeply subterranean bacteria which ingest some rocks and gases, and exude changed rocks and gases, thereby changing the structure of the earth. Another example is bacteria which ingests sulphur dioxide and exudes changes to produce gold or iron pyrite. Nothing is really inert. Shakes up our concept of standing on solid ground.
We Are Eating the Earth: the Race to Fix Our Food Systems and Save Our Climate by Michael Grunwad: it’s not just the animals eating vast areas of watered grasses, etc, and producing methane. It’s also we who eat both them and farmed produce as well. All life is part of the problem; all life is part of the solution.
The Call of the Honeyguide: What Science Tells Us About How to Live Well With the Rest of Life by Rob Dunne: Honeyguide birds call to people who collect honey, to alert them to the location and readiness of bee hives. The people benefit from collecting the honey, and the birds from collecting the wax. There are whales which alert fishers to schools of certain other fish, assisting the fishers by shepherding the fish; the fishers gather them in nets, but leave certain parts of the fish for the whales, a bargain which must be strictly kept. Many other examples lead to the proposal that we could find and/or produce what we need in ways that are more efficient for us and that benefit the other forms of life as well.
An Immense World: How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us, by Ed Yong: recent increased ability to observe animals in the wild reveal much new information about their ability to communicate, plan, and socialize. Challenges our assumptions about their significance in the scheme of things.
The Internet of Animals: Discovering the Collective Intelligence of Life on Earth, by Martin Wikelski. Recent new abilities to track by radio the movements of animals enable us to know more about where and when they migrate, assemble, and abide. Author foresees a time when our weather reports will include reports of animal behaviours over near and far areas which will describe and foretell, for example, weather conditions and the health of the soil.
The Light Eaters: How the Unseen World of Plant Intelligence Offers A New Understanding of Life on Earth by Zoë Schlanger: the title says all.
The Forest Unseen, by David George Haskell: an account of forest life in a small circle in woods near his home, including algae, birds, small and large animals, bugs and insects, as well as flowers and trees and life in and among them, throughout a year. Anyone who reads this will be struck by how astonishingly rich Nature is even in a small area and will intuitively understand why being much more care-full about how we treat them we must be. A huge treasure of why the earth is worth preserving.
Planta Sapiens: The New Science of Plant Intelligence, by Paco Calvo and Natalie Lawrence: how does a plant in a cup on a window, having followed the sun as it passes by the window, know where to turn back to in preparation for the next morning’s sun? How does one variety of vine, adhering to a tree or other plant, mimic it, i.e., take on its appearance? Does it replicate by some photograph-like method? Does it collect microbiomes from the host plant to change its appearance? And why? A large number of examples of plants doing things which would seem to require what we think of as intelligence, and a discussion of how they might be doing it.
The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate : Discoveries From A Secret World by Peter Wohlleben: title says it all.
1 Nature and the Mind: The Science of How Nature Improves Cognitive, Physical and Social Well-being. Paul Berman.
Berman studies how being in nature aids resting “directed attention”, thereby decreasing the sense of pressure in our lives, relaxing our bodies, and giving the mind room to roam freely. By “nature” Berman means primarily being among plants, trees, and water, rather than among animals.
He discerns that viewing the natural fractal patterns on beaches, leaves, and flowers, relaxes the mind and allows it to enjoy the fact of the fractals rather than keen discernment of them. He calls this “soft fascination.” The mind seems to accept the general presence of fractals and not need to examine them carefully. This quality, together with the curves and other shapes of nature (no straight lines), and the colours blue and green, and the presence of living water, can be somewhat imitated by humans in sculpture, architecture, photographs or paintings of nature. Walking in nature, rather than just sitting and looking, may augment the benefits. The benefits are calmness, relaxation of deliberate thinking, improved cognitive abilities when tested after time in nature, and a general feeling of getting along better with Life.
Upon reconsidering... 