Abstract
It has been proposed by some plant scientists that plants are cognitive and conscious organisms, although this is a minority view. Here we present a brief summary of some of the arguments against this view, followed by a critique of an article in this same issue of Biochemical and Biophysical Research Communications by Calvo, Baluska, and Trewavas (2020) that cites Integrated Information Theory (IIT) as providing additional support for plant consciousness. The authors base their argument on the assumptions that all cells are conscious and that consciousness is confined to life. However, IIT allows for consciousness in various nonliving systems, and thus does not restrict consciousness to living organisms. Therefore, IIT cannot be used to prove plant consciousness, for which there is neither empirical evidence nor support from other, neuron-based, theories of consciousness.
•We discuss a concurrent paper by Calvo and coworkers that claims plants have consciousness.•That paper claims support from the well-known Integration Information Theory (IIT) of consciousness.•That paper also claims that consciousness is confined to living systems.•However, IIT attributes consciousness to many nonliving systems.•Therefore, IIT does not support plant consciousness as claimed.