Abstract
There is growing evidence that plants possess abilities associated with cognition, such as decision-making, anticipation and learning. And yet, the cognitive status of plants continues to be contested. Among the threats to plant cognitive status is the ‘Representation Demarcation Challenge’ which points to the absence of a seemingly defining aspect of cognition, namely, computation over representation with non-derived content. Defenders of plant cognition may appeal to post-cognitivist perspectives, such as enactivism, which challenge the assumptions of the Representation Demarcation Challenge. This points to an impasse in the debate over plant cognition as it collapses into perennial disagreements over the best way to conceptualise the very nature of cognition. I propose a path that allows us to bypass this quagmire by reconceiving the question of what is cognitive about ‘plant cognition’ in terms of a quest to map the many possible adaptive capacities and behaviours more-or-less associated with cognition, alongside their underlying processes and mechanisms. In turn, we can examine the degrees of similarity between plants and more paradigmatically cognitive creatures. The ‘piecemeal approach’ thus shifts attention away from the abstract and dichotomous question of whether plants are cognitive and towards a series of more precise questions about the many ways and extent to which plants possess features associated with cognition. Ultimately, I suggest, the value of viewing plants through a cognitive lens may lie less in determining whether they are bona fide cognitive creatures and more in guiding research into concrete abilities and their underlying causes.
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Notes
The value of two requiring two stimulations is likely that it ensures prey is large enough to warrant the energy expenditure of closing and/or it guards against accidental triggering by non-prey (false positives).
There are other contexts where ‘minimal’ does not imply a diminutive form, for example, in the context of ‘minimal model’ explanations (Batterman, 2014).
It is becoming common to talk of ‘basal cognition’, evading any unwelcome connotations of ‘minimal’ (e.g., Lyon et al., 2021). The comparative value of these terms needn’t worry us here.
Cognitivists are not committed to defending the RDC. For example, one might think cognitivism is our best theory for exemplary cases of cognition but grant the existence of non-orthodox cases that do not involve representation (see § 5 for related discussion).
One complication arising from these accounts is the role of representation in computation. Some proponents, including Piccinini (2020), hold that computation is not necessarily semantic (although see Maley, 2018), yet they maintain that neural computation does involve representation. Nevertheless, the non-semantic nature of computation at least opens the door for a theory in which cognition is computational but not representational (e.g., Dewhurst, 2018).
Of course, one might question the value of the behaviour/cognition distinction and some post-cognitivist perspectives appear to willingly reject it. However, it is not only cognitivists who castigate characterisations of cognition in terms of behaviour. Barandiaran and Moreno (2006) argue against ‘behavioristic characterizations’ in favour of an understanding, following an enactivist tradition, in terms of the adaptive-autonomy of nervous systems. Citing Searle’s (1980) Chinese Room thought experiment, the authors share the fear of conflating genuine cognition with its mere simulation at a behavioural level. See § 4 and § 5.3 for related discussion.
In some guises, the biogenic approach seems more concerned with constraints on empirically investigating cognition and less on the underlying character of cognition per se (though the former has implications for the latter). The hermeneutic challenges surrounding the biogenic approach needn’t preoccupy us here, however.
As the authors acknowledge, some enactivists remain sceptical of plant cognition (e.g., Froese and Di Paolo, 2011), so even from within this post-cognitivist framework there is room for disagreement about the boundaries of cognition.
I take it that some of the positions mentioned, such as that of Segundo-Ortin and Calvo (2019), can be reinterpreted through the lens of the piecemeal approach set out below. More generally, I take it that enactivists (alongside cognitivists) are not necessarily committed to cognition possessing a core, essence or mark as explored below. In any case, the appeal to particular post-cognitivist theories for redrawing the borders of cognition (in contrast to cognitivism) is illustrative as a contrast to the piecemeal approach.
The piecemeal approach is consistent with a rejection of the idea that cognition possesses a sufficiently robust core, mark or essence and is instead a graded notion, cluster concept or plurality of kinds. See § 5.2.
This is arguably what plant scientists studying ‘plant cognition’ are principally concerned with i.e., the sorts of capacities or behaviours and the kinds of processes or mechanisms that plants are capable of. Indeed, empirical investigations into cognitive or cognitive-like capacities, such as decision-making, and their mechanisms, such as neurotransmitters, do not depend on demonstrating that plants possess ‘cognition per se’. To this extent, the piecemeal approach reflects scientific practice. However, I make no claims about the presumably diverse views on plant cognition among the community of scientists studying ‘plant cognition’.
The concept of cognition has become more liberal over time (cf. Akagi, 2018); once restricted to abilities associated with deliberative thinking, capacities such as perception are now included. At first pass, those abilities associated with the more restricted notion are the more prototypically cognitive. Regardless, how to understand the centrality of an ability to the cluster concept comprising cognition (which I am not defending) is not essential for our discussion.
One way to understand the relative ease of establishing that some species is capable of associative learning versus causal cognition, theory of mind, mental time travel etc., is that associative learning is characterised by fewer dimensions, so recognising its presence of absence depends less ambiguously on similarity judgements.
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Acknowledgements
The author would like to thank Paco Calvo, Becky Millar and Joe Dewhurst for their helpful comments on an earlier draft.
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This research was supported by a Juan de la Cierva Fellowship from Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación del Gobierno de España (Award # FJC2019-041071-I).
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Lee, J. What is cognitive about ‘plant cognition’?. Biol Philos 38, 18 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10539-023-09907-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10539-023-09907-z