Ezra Klein

Consciousness is how humans do sentience.

And we've added lots of bells and whistles, like the stream of consciousness, like self-reflection, like the fact that we're aware that we're aware.

Most other creatures are just aware, although we recently learned that chimps have imagination, which is kind of mind-blowing.

How did we learn that?

Experiments.

They got chimps, as I recall, to play a kind of tea party game, you know, as you would play with a kid.

And, you know, they're pouring an empty pitcher into cups, and they get completely into the game, and there's some reason you can tell that they know it's not real.

So they're imagining this.

Every time we build a wall and say, only humans can do this, we find that actually, no, other animals can.

So anesthetized plants.

Yeah.

So one of the experiments these guys did was take anesthetics that work on humans, including a really bizarre one called xenon gas.

I say it's bizarre because xenon gas is inert, yet somehow it puts us out if you expose us to the gas, which is weird because there's no chemical reaction going on.

And if you take a carnivorous plant or a sensitive plant, mimosa pudica, which is the one, the tropical plant, if you touch it, it kind of collapses its leaves, and you give it the xenon gas or any number of other anesthetics that work on us, they won't react.

There'll be a period where they appear to be asleep, and then they'll regain their ability.

So the fact that plants have two states of being is,

is a very pregnant idea.

And, you know, there's this- At least two states of being.

At least two states, right.

Two that we've identified, lights on, lights off.