FUNGI & SYMBIOSOS IN LIFE - Merlin Sheldrake PhD #91

Why were fungi so important to the evolution of life on earth? How do they collaborate with plants to help them communicate? What does the difficulty separating individual fungi from the collective of a mycelial network teach us about collective intelligence and interconnected co-dependence in ecosystems?

In this episode we discuss how fungi are a brilliant example of symbiosis in nature. We get into their importance to evolution; how they facilitate plant communication; how they exhibit both collaboration and competition simultaneously; how they can solve problems without brains; and how they confound our ideas of ‘self’ and ‘other’.

Fortunately to decode these ideas we have biologist, ecologist, mycologist and award winning author Merlin Sheldrake as our guide. He is a research associate at Oxford University and Vrije University in Amsterdam. He has written 20 scientific papers and his 2020 book “Entangled life - How Fungi make our worlds, change our minds, and shape our futures”, has sold more than a million copies in over 30 languages. The book received the 2021 Royal Society Science book award and the Wainwright prize for writing on Global Conservation.

What we discuss:

00:00 Intro

05:00 Entangled Life Book.

06:40 The difference between the plant and fungal kingdoms.

08:00 Mycelium Networks: shapeshifting, sprawling networks.

09:55 Fungi’s symbiotic role in early evolution of land plants.

13:15 Mychorrhizal fungi: plant partners.

14:00 Katie Field - Re-creating early earth conditions in the lab.

15:50 Plant-Fungi electrical and chemical signalling.

19:40 Mutual vs parasitic simbiosis.

22:15 Inherent intelligence in fungi behaviour.

27:15 The skin and gut microbiome.

31:45 The enteric nervous system - possible mood changer.

33:00 The dance of competition and cooperation in evolution.

37:30 Climate Change innovations with fungi - Carbon cycling.

39:50 Writing Fungi into conservation targets with better data.

42:00 Fungal problem solving and distributed intelligence.

46:00 The blurring of self and other - fungi make us reconsider our separateness.

48:00 Individuality is a convenient concept but over emphasised.

50:00 The wood wide web over romanticised concept.

52:00 Fungal communication studies.

55:00 Sound communication in plants & fungi.

58:00 Implications of plant and mushroom memory.

References:

Merlin Sheldrake, “Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures”.

Dr. Katie Field, ‘How fungi helped create life as we know it’ article.

Justin D. Stewart et al, ‘Global density and biomass of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungal networks’ Paper.

Loteto Galvez et al, ‘A travelling-wave strategy for plant–fungal trade’.