Contrary to F. Adams' claim that plants and bacteria lack cognition because they respond inflexibly to immediate stimuli, empirical evidence from plant neurobiology shows that plant behavior is often analogous to animal behavior. Plants exhibit adaptive behavior, decision-making, anticipation, learning, and memory, and possess a 'phyto-nervous' system. This evidence supports describing plants as cognitive agents in a non-metaphorical way, aligning with enactive and ecological approaches in cognitive science. The article aims to advance public understanding of plant intelligence by challenging anthropocentric assumptions.
Plants inspire soft robotics through their non-centralized, modular architecture and highly plastic phenotype. A holistic approach to plant bioinspiration, drawing on plant intelligence and behavior, supports an enactivist perspective that emphasizes embodiment and autonomy. Enactivist autonomy concerns the dynamics of self-producing systems like plants that create a distinction between themselves and their environment, contrasting with a diluted notion of independent operability. This distinction is relevant for evaluating limitations on existing growing robots ("growbots") that depend on external energy and material. Plant-inspired robots serve as a case study for an enactivist approach to intelligence, highlighting non-zoological forms of intelligence embodied in self-organizing, autonomous systems.