The Light Eaters
The New Science of Plant Intelligence
Published on 9. May 2024
Book
Hardback
304 pages
978-0-00-844534-8 (ISBN)
Description
"teeming with fascinating and enlightening insights" Observer
A narrative investigation into the new science of plant intelligence and sentience, from National Association of Science Writers Award winner and Livingston Award finalist Zoe Schlanger.
Look at the green organism across the room or through the window: the potted plant, or the grass or a tree. Think how a life spent constantly growing yet rooted in a single spot comes with tremendous challenges. To meet them, plants have come up with some of the most creative methods for surviving of any living thing - us included. Many are so ingenious that they seem nearly impossible.
Did you know plants can communicate when they are being eaten, allowing nearby plants to bolster their defences? They move and that movement stops when they are anaesthetised. They also use electricity for internal communication. They can hear the sounds of caterpillars eating. Plants can remember the last time they have been visited by a bee and how many times they have been visited - so they have a concept of time and can count. Plants can not only communicate with each other, they can also communicate with other species of plants and animals, allowing them to manipulate animals to defend or fertilise them.
So look again at the potted plant, or the grass or the tree and wonder: are plants intelligent?
Or perhaps ask an even more fundamental question: are they conscious?
The Light Eaters will completely redefine how you think about plants. Packed with the most amazing stories of the life of plants it will open your eyes to the extraordinary green life forms we share the planet with.
A narrative investigation into the new science of plant intelligence and sentience, from National Association of Science Writers Award winner and Livingston Award finalist Zoe Schlanger.
Look at the green organism across the room or through the window: the potted plant, or the grass or a tree. Think how a life spent constantly growing yet rooted in a single spot comes with tremendous challenges. To meet them, plants have come up with some of the most creative methods for surviving of any living thing - us included. Many are so ingenious that they seem nearly impossible.
Did you know plants can communicate when they are being eaten, allowing nearby plants to bolster their defences? They move and that movement stops when they are anaesthetised. They also use electricity for internal communication. They can hear the sounds of caterpillars eating. Plants can remember the last time they have been visited by a bee and how many times they have been visited - so they have a concept of time and can count. Plants can not only communicate with each other, they can also communicate with other species of plants and animals, allowing them to manipulate animals to defend or fertilise them.
So look again at the potted plant, or the grass or the tree and wonder: are plants intelligent?
Or perhaps ask an even more fundamental question: are they conscious?
The Light Eaters will completely redefine how you think about plants. Packed with the most amazing stories of the life of plants it will open your eyes to the extraordinary green life forms we share the planet with.
Reviews / Votes
"A masterpiece of science writing." Robin Wall Kimmerer, author of Braiding Sweetgrass"Mesmerizing, world-expanding, and achingly beautiful." Ed Yong, author of An Immense World
"Rich, vital, and full of surprises. Read it!" Elizabeth Kolbert, author of Under a White Sky and The Sixth Extinction
"overflows with the author's infectious enthusiasm. Plant lovers will find much of interest" Nature
"To read The Light Eaters is to be astounded by the complex behaviors of these ostensibly lower life-forms. Fertilize your brain with The Light Eaters and you'll never look at your favorite, or least favorite, plants the same." Wall Street Journal
"Schlanger's captivating exploration renders a rich world of plants: weird fern sex, sagebrush chemical communication, scientific debates on flora intelligence, and more." Vanity Fair
"...Schlanger reminds us of a common truth that we tend to take for granted: plants are remarkable ... a surprising and tender book of science writing that urges us all to reconsider how we think about the greenery that lives both in our homes and outside of them." TIME, The 10 Best Nonfiction Books of 2024
"... looks beyond the leaves and branches to how our verdant neighbors perceive our world, offering a plant's eye view of life... . [The Light Eaters] shines." Smithsonian magazine, "The Ten Best Science Books of 2024"
"The human mind will boggle at least once per page." Boston Globe, 75 Best Books of 2024
"The vegetable kingdom is full of wonders and mysteries, as Schlanger lavishly demonstrates." Slate
"Zoe Schlanger takes us across the globe, digging into her own memories and into the soil with the scientists who have spent their waking days studying these amazing entities up close." New York Public Library, "Best Books for Adults 2024"
"A brilliant must-read. This book shook and changed me." David George Haskell, author of Sounds Wild and Broken, The Songs of Trees, and The Forest Unseen
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
HarperCollins Publishers
Illustrations
Index
Dimensions
Height: 240 mm
Width: 163 mm
Thickness: 36 mm
Weight
514 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-00-844534-8 (9780008445348)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
E-Book
05/2024
Fourth Estate Ltd
€7.69
Available for download
Person
Zoe Schlanger is currently a staff reporter at the Atlantic, where she covers climate change. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, the New York Review of Books, Time, Newsweek, The Nation, Quartz, and on NPR among other major outlets, and in the 2022 Best American Science and Nature Writing anthology. A recipient of a 2017 National Association of Science Writers' reporting award, she is often a guest speaker in schools and universities. Zoe graduated with a B.A. from New York University.