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SUMMARY:Nature and Environment Book Club: The Light Eaters
DESCRIPTION:Please contact facilitator Hilary Caws-Elwitt for updated 
 meeting info.\n\n \n\nThe Nature and Environment Book Club is devoted to 
 the best of nature writing and environmental reporting with discussions on 
 the second Wednesday of each month. Readers and writers interested in books 
 ranging from such classics as Annie Dillard’s Pilgrim at Tinker Creek to 
 topical reportage like Elizabeth Kolbert’s The Sixth Extinction will want 
 to join the conversation.\n\n \n\nThis month's book is The Light Eaters by 
 Zoë Schlanger. \n\nIt takes tremendous biological creativity to be a 
 plant. To survive and thrive while rooted in a single spot\, plants have 
 adapted ingenious methods of survival. In recent years\, scientists have 
 learned about their ability to communicate\, recognize their kin and behave 
 socially\, hear sounds\, morph their bodies to blend into their 
 surroundings\, store useful memories that inform their life cycle\, and 
 trick animals into behaving to their benefit\, to name just a few 
 remarkable talents.\n\nThe Light Eaters is a deep immersion into the drama 
 of green life and the complexity of this wild and awe-inspiring world that 
 challenges our very understanding of agency\, consciousness\, and 
 intelligence. In looking closely\, we see that plants\, rather than imitate 
 human intelligence\, have perhaps formed a parallel system. What is 
 intelligent life if not a vine that grows leaves to blend into the shrub on 
 which it climbs\, a flower that shapes its bloom to fit exactly the beak of 
 its pollinator\, a pea seedling that can hear water flowing and make its 
 way toward it? Zoë 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.\n\nWhat can we learn 
 about life on Earth from the living things that thrive\, adapt\, consume\, 
 and accommodate simultaneously? More important\, what do we owe these life 
 forms once we come to understand their rich and varied abilities? Examining 
 the latest epiphanies in botanical research\, Schlanger spotlights the 
 intellectual struggles among the researchers conceiving a wholly new view 
 of their subject\, offering a glimpse of a field in turmoil as plant 
 scientists debate the tenets of ongoing discoveries and how they influence 
 our understanding of what a plant is.\n\nWe need plants to survive. But 
 what do they need us for—if at all? An eye-opening and informative look 
 at the ecosystem we live in\, this book challenges us to rethink the role 
 of plants—and our own place—in the natural world.\n\n \n\n
LOCATION:Watson Room
ORGANIZER;CN="Forbes Library":MAILTO:info@forbeslibrary.org
CATEGORIES:Adult Events, Book Discussions, Recurring Events
CONTACT;CN="Forbes Library":MAILTO:info@forbeslibrary.org
STATUS:CONFIRMED
UID:LibCal-11408488
URL:https://forbeslibrary.libcal.com/event/11408488
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