Zoocentrism in the weeds? Cultivating plant models for cognitive yield
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Zoocentrism in the weeds? Cultivating plant models for cognitive yield Adam Linson1 · Paco Calvo2 Received: 4 May 2020 / Accepted: 28 August 2020 © The Author(s) 2020
Abstract It remains at best controversial to claim, non-figuratively, that plants are cognitive agents. At the same time, it is taken as trivially true that many (if not all) animals are cognitive agents, arguably through an implicit or explicit appeal to natural science. Yet, any given definition of cognition implicates at least some further processes, such as perception, action, memory, and learning, which must be observed either behaviorally, psychologically, neuronally, or otherwise physiologically. Crucially, however, for such observations to be intelligible, they must be counted as evidence for some model. These models in turn point to homologies of physiology and behavior that facilitate the attribution of cognition to some non-human animals. But, if one is dealing with a model of animal cognition, it is tautological that only animals can provide evidence, and absurd to claim that plants can. The more substantive claim that, given a general model of cognition, only animals but not plants can provide evidence, must be evaluated on its merits. As evidence mounts that plants meet established criteria of cognition, from physiology to behavior, they continue to be denied entry into the cognitive club. We trace this exclusionary tendency back to Aristotle, and attempt to counter it by drawing on the philosophy of modelling and a range of findings from plant science. Our argument illustrates how a difference in degree between plant and animals is typically mistaken for a difference in kind. Keywords Homology · Homoplasy · Model organisms · Cognitive modelling · Minimal cognition · Aristotle
* Adam Linson [email protected] 1
University of Stirling, Stirling, UK
2
Universidad de Murcia, Murcia, Spain
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A. Linson, P. Calvo
Introduction: What’s in a kingdom name? Biological taxonomy is anything but straightforward. While there is an obvious relationship between the branches of the ‘tree of life’ and lines of direct genetic descent, there are further complexities in play when it comes to sub-dividing creatures into different species and even kingdoms (Whittaker 1969). Branches are defined differently depending on criteria ranging from operational considerations to various forms of ontological classification by natural kind (Bird 2018). There is also a subtle but enduring historical influence that contributes to how scientists and philosophers regard relationships between taxonomy and homology (Griffiths 2007; Hall 2003; Scotland 2010). The construal of these relationships is especially relevant for cognitive phenomena. Specifically, taxonomic considerations influence how behavioral homologies are understood, where the latter are tied to such processes as perception, action, memory, and learning (Ereshefsky 2007a). However, due to how physiology diverges in speciation, there is a strong normative c
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