Goats know. Sheep know. Equines know. If I make sure the farm animals have access to different flora around the pastures they won't get ill. It's nice following the animals around and finding out what they eat, and other ways they use plants. The more time I spend with animals the more I think it's us humans being the dumb ones.

On that note, watching what great apes do in their natural habitat might teach us a few things about plants.

[–] blargerer@kbin.social 19 points 6 months ago (8 children)

In the case of wild primates I would believe they know as we would use the word. For Goats, Sheep, Or Equines, I have to imagine its closer to how we get cravings for foods sometimes, because we have some sort of nutrient deficiency that food would correct.

[–] schmorpel@slrpnk.net 10 points 6 months ago (4 children)

That would lead into philosophical discussions as to what knowledge means. I do see that we have the tendency of assuming others have less agency or are less aware of their actions than us. We do that as individuals and as a species, so I tend to be careful. I also wish I had useful food cravings, mine don't tend to be too healthy.

[–] abfarid@startrek.website 5 points 6 months ago (2 children)

I don't see how this is philosophical. One is an instinct, which is passed down genetically, and the other is knowledge, gained through experience. They are two distinct processes.

[–] schmorpel@slrpnk.net 2 points 6 months ago (1 children)

What do we really know about animal and plant communication? They might very well be talking to each other. Don't be too quick to assume that as a human you would even know how other consciousnesses, let alone ways of communication, could work.

People who work closely with animals seem to lose their 'human smart, monke stupid' attitude relatively quickly, and those who study non-human consciousness deeply seem to make one groundbreaking discovery after the other these days.

We have to stop gatekeeping knowledge and start listening.

[–] abfarid@startrek.website 1 points 6 months ago

I agree, research confirms that intra-species communication between animals and plants is real, though the term "communication" often does a lot of heavy-lifting in those studies. And while it's possible that goats have some built-in pheromone message encoder for transmitting complex ideas, such as "Daaandelion = helth", which we simply have not yet discovered, it is unlikely. At best, goats can demonstrate to other goats what to eat by example. However, even a solitary goat on a farm, one that has never seen other goats, will instinctively seek out specific plants when it's deficient in certain nutrients. It doesn't require a huge leap of faith to assume that this behavior extends to medicinal plants as well.
In other words, the goat doesn't know that it needs to eat a certain plant; it feels like it needs to eat a certain plant.
This principle even applies to humans, as babies will often eat dirt if they have a calcium deficiency. Clearly, they were never taught to do this, neither by adults (hopefully) nor by other babies.

[–] SoleInvictus@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 6 months ago

Do we know that for sure, though? We'd have to isolate some goats in an experiment to determine it.

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