There's increasing evidence to show that trees are able to communicate with each other.

[Landon Caeli]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3792036/Do-trees-brains.html

"Forester Peter Wohlleben believes trees must be able to store and transmit information"

"It sounds incredible, but when you discover how trees talk to each other, feel pain, nurture each other, even care for their close relatives and organise themselves into communities, it's hard to be sceptical."

 

[Landon Caeli]

Trees do have DNA and RNA, which communicate on a molecular level, so it might be possible.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/08/140814191939.htm

 

[AV1611VET]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3792036/Do-trees-brains.html

"Forester Peter Wohlleben believes trees must be able to store and transmit information"

"It sounds incredible, but when you discover how trees talk to each other, feel pain, nurture each other, even care for their close relatives and organise themselves into communities, it's hard to be sceptical."

Judges 9:7 And when they told it to Jotham, he went and stood in the top of mount Gerizim, and lifted up his voice, and cried, and said unto them, Hearken unto me, ye men of Shechem, that God may hearken unto you.
8 The trees went forth on a time to anoint a king over them; and they said unto the olive tree, Reign thou over us.
9 But the olive tree said unto them, Should I leave my fatness, wherewith by me they honour God and man, and go to be promoted over the trees?
10 And the trees said to the fig tree, Come thou, and reign over us.
11 But the fig tree said unto them, Should I forsake my sweetness, and my good fruit, and go to be promoted over the trees?
12 Then said the trees unto the vine, Come thou, and reign over us.
13 And the vine said unto them, Should I leave my wine, which cheereth God and man, and go to be promoted over the trees?
14 Then said all the trees unto the bramble, Come thou, and reign over us.
15 And the bramble said unto the trees, If in truth ye anoint me king over you, then come and put your trust in my shadow: and if not, let fire come out of the bramble, and devour the cedars of Lebanon.

 

[-57]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3792036/Do-trees-brains.html

"Forester Peter Wohlleben believes trees must be able to store and transmit information"

"It sounds incredible, but when you discover how trees talk to each other, feel pain, nurture each other, even care for their close relatives and organise themselves into communities, it's hard to be sceptical."

Sounds like..if true...an other article supporting intelligent design.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

Trees are known to communicate (warnings of attack) via chemical signals between their root systems and indirectly via mycorrhizal mycelia (thread-like fungal structures associate with the roots). These are preferentially associated with trees of the same species and particularly siblings and offspring; a possible example of kin selection and consistent with what one might expect from the genetics of evolution (popularly, the 'selfish gene').

 

[-57]

Trees are known to communicate (warnings of attack) via chemical signals between their root systems and indirectly via mycorrhizal mycelia (thread-like fungal structures associate with the roots). These are preferentially associated with trees of the same species and particularly siblings and offspring; a possible example of kin selection and consistent with what one might expect from the genetics of evolution (popularly, the 'selfish gene').

How is it consistent with what one might expect from the genetics of evolution?

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

How is it consistent with what one might expect from the genetics of evolution?

Where genes are the units of hereditary variation and selection acts on the product of the expression of those genes, the genes are the fitness determinants, so a lineage will, over the generations, tend to maximize its inclusive fitness (i.e. the fitness of those expressing the same genes), which leads to the evolution of cooperative behaviours in proportion to the closeness of the genetic relation and competitive behaviours in inverse proportion. IOW, the closer the kin, the more they are tolerated and even given altruistic help (altruistic in terms of the individual).

 

[-57]

Where genes are the units of hereditary variation and selection acts on the product of the expression of those genes, the genes are the fitness determinants, so a lineage will, over the generations, tend to maximize its inclusive fitness (i.e. the fitness of those expressing the same genes), which leads to the evolution of cooperative behaviours in proportion to the closeness of the genetic relation and competitive behaviours in inverse proportion. IOW, the closer the kin, the more they are tolerated and even given altruistic help (altruistic in terms of the individual).

You mentioned "variation"...all the while neglecting the exactness of "variation" if evolutionism can even possibly work and cause trees to communicate.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

You mentioned "variation"...all the while neglecting the exactness of "variation" if evolutionism can even possibly work and cause trees to communicate.

What do you mean 'exactness'? the variation (in the genes or their regulation) is random, and selection eliminates the variations that can't compete.

If a tree produces a tree-wide protective chemical response to insect attack (as many do), it need only become sufficiently sensitive in its roots to have that response triggered by the traces of those chemicals leaching from another tree's roots that are in close contact, to have a huge pre-emptive advantage. It might only take a single mutation in a regulatory gene that switches on the gene that triggers the response in root cells. A simple response of that sort could be elaborated over time by further variations, but even in its basic form it would constitute a chemical communication between trees.

 

[Grafted In]

I'm still struggling to get my mind around the fact that trees, and all plantlife, has a system of fibers that transport light to the root system below ground.

 

[Landon Caeli]

I'm still struggling to get my mind around the fact that trees, and all plantlife, has a system of fibers that transport light to the root system below ground.

Life can do some amazing things. That's for sure.

 

[-57]

If a tree produces a tree-wide protective chemical response to insect attack

Just like that...a tree produces....
You feel to realize the exactness...multiple exactness..of mutations required to produce a protective chemical.

 

[lesliedellow]

Just like that...a tree produces....
You feel to realize the exactness...multiple exactness..of mutations required to produce a protective chemical.

And how would you know how many mutations would be needed for an existing process to be modified in such a way that a protective chemical was produced, and then selected for?

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

Just like that...a tree produces....
You feel to realize the exactness...multiple exactness..of mutations required to produce a protective chemical.

Not really - alkaloids and resins have been around since plants first appeared (alkaloids since long before that, in bacteria and fungi). They're relatively simple to make, biologically - resins come from breaking down cellulose, and some alkaloids are used in metabolism. The thing about organic chemistry is that it's easy to make an enormous variety of similar molecules, many of which will have similar chemistry, but some of which will behave very differently. It would be quite possible for a single mutation to cause a variation in an existing molecule that makes it significantly toxic to non-plant metabolism, but still performs its original function (perhaps less effectively), or a variation of a catalyst that makes the process more efficient or changes the balance of the reaction products to favour a toxic product.

It's just the same kind of process we've been exploiting in crop plants since the beginning of agricuture - only the selection process is different. Look at the varieties we've produced from relatively small populations in a few thousand years, most quite unrecognisable compared to the originals.

Nature has had far larger populations and a couple of billion years with survival as the unambiguous selection criterion. Your appeals to incredulity are understandable, but misplaced.

 

[-57]

And how would you know how many mutations would be needed for an existing process to be modified in such a way that a protective chemical was produced, and then selected for?

Considering evolution adding information via mutations is impossible....Your question is kinda moot.

 

[-57]

Not really - alkaloids and resins have been around since plants first appeared (alkaloids since long before that, in bacteria and fungi). They're relatively simple to make, biologically - resins come from breaking down cellulose, and some alkaloids are used in metabolism. The thing about organic chemistry is that it's easy to make an enormous variety of similar molecules, many of which will have similar chemistry, but some of which will behave very differently. It would be quite possible for a single mutation to cause a variation in an existing molecule that makes it significantly toxic to non-plant metabolism, but still performs its original function (perhaps less effectively), or a variation of a catalyst that makes the process more efficient or changes the balance of the reaction products to favour a toxic product.

It's just the same kind of process we've been exploiting in crop plants since the beginning of agricuture - only the selection process is different. Look at the varieties we've produced from relatively small populations in a few thousand years, most quite unrecognisable compared to the originals.

Nature has had far larger populations and a couple of billion years with survival as the unambiguous selection criterion. Your appeals to incredulity are understandable, but misplaced.

You said "Look at the varieties we've produced from relatively small populations in a few thousand years,"
Sounds like ID to me.

You also posted "It would be quite possible for a single mutation to cause a variation in an existing molecule that makes it significantly toxic to non-plant metabolism"
Your problem is adding to a mutation that has enhanced the fitness of an organism. Let me repeat....Your problem is adding to a mutation that has enhanced the fitness of an organism. The odds alone tell us a second mutation BY CHANCE occurring in the DNA that adds to the first...is impossible....let alone a third, fourth, fifth, etc.

But, you always have your magical saying..."and a couple of billion years"

 

[VanillaSunflowers]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3792036/Do-trees-brains.html

"Forester Peter Wohlleben believes trees must be able to store and transmit information"

"It sounds incredible, but when you discover how trees talk to each other, feel pain, nurture each other, even care for their close relatives and organise themselves into communities, it's hard to be sceptical."

This is only news to the scientists that think they discovered something new.

“Ask the animals, and they will teach you, or the birds of the air, and they will tell you; or speak to the earth, and it will teach you, or let the fish of the sea inform you. Which of these does not know that the hand of the Lord has done this? In his hand is the life of every creature and the breath of all mankind.” (Job 12:7-10)

 

[lesliedellow]

Considering evolution adding information via mutations is impossible....Your question is kinda moot.

Do creationists really really have to keep repeating that vacuous nonsense? They demonstrate only that they haven't got a clue what they are talking about.

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

You said "Look at the varieties we've produced from relatively small populations in a few thousand years,"
Sounds like ID to me.

The only difference from evolution by natural selection is that we selected for traits we wanted rather than leaving it to 'survival of the fittest', and we speeded it up a little by manual cross-pollination instead of letting wind & insects do it.

Your problem is adding to a mutation that has enhanced the fitness of an organism. Let me repeat....Your problem is adding to a mutation that has enhanced the fitness of an organism. The odds alone tell us a second mutation BY CHANCE occurring in the DNA that adds to the first...is impossible....let alone a third, fourth, fifth, etc.

No, it's not impossible. It's been seen in plants in wild and there's plenty of evidence of past occurrences in the genome. For sizeable populations producing the numbers of germinated offspring we see in the wild, even one-in-a-billion chances will turn up every thousand years or so.

If you look at a particular advantageous mutation or sequence of mutations in hindsight, it might appear extremely unlikely, but a naive retrospective calculation of the odds leads to the lottery fallacy (e.g. the chance of any one individual winning are millions to one, but since millions of people enter, it's almost certain that someone will win); IOW there is a vast number of other possibilities that did not occur or were selected out, some of which would have also been advantageous.

But, you always have your magical saying..."and a couple of billion years"

It's not magic, just 'deep time'.

 

[Jimmy D]

.Your problem is adding to a mutation that has enhanced the fitness of an organism. The odds alone tell us a second mutation BY CHANCE occurring in the DNA that adds to the first...is impossible....let alone a third, fourth, fifth, etc.

Have you calculated these odds or are you just making things up?