[split] "Some people eat animals, some don't."

[Billy]

Is this planet not going 4th density positive?  If that is the case, as Ra indicates, does it not stand to reason that part of that transition would include the cessation of eating animals?  I just for the life of me cannot imagine a loving society killing and eating animals but perhaps I am wrong.  Perhaps there is a way to kill and eat an animal in a way which is respectful and does not abridge free will.  If there is, I sure haven't come across it and honestly, all the justifications I have read for eating animals fall short.  If am being judgmental, self serving or close minded feel free to point it out.

Change is not a one time thing, it takes time and follows the slow evolution of consciousness else densities would be very short and there wouldn't be much meaning to spiritual evolution.

Each planet is unique in it's ways and reflect a different reality/aspect of the Creator which is equally as valid as any other. 

I do believe there has been many planets where killing animals for meat might not even have been thought of, even in 3rd density.

I don't know, maybe it is because of limited view, but I feel as though this planet has had it's fun and experienced it's fair share of negativity, pain and misery.  Why not time for a change?  Surely change is better than stagnation.

[Jeremy]

How do you propose such a change?

[Billy]

How do you propose such a change?

Apart from being an example, I don't know how else to promote change effectively.  I agree that change is something each person must decide for themselves otherwise it wouldn't be very meaningful or lasting.  I would just more generally like to see a more compassionate and loving world.  I have no strategies or plans to really do so however.

[Aion]

Well, no one seems to care so much about the sufferings of plants even so I don't see us moving away from consuming other life forms any time soon.

Of course, I think eating plants is just as disturbing as eating animals. Fruit is the way to go.

[ree]

We should all be breatharians then

[Aion]

That would be wonderful, if you can get over consuming microbes.

[Minyatur]

How do you propose such a change?

Apart from being an example, I don't know how else to promote change effectively.  I agree that change is something each person must decide for themselves otherwise it wouldn't be very meaningful or lasting.  I would just more generally like to see a more compassionate and loving world.  I have no strategies or plans to really do so however.

If the planet were to suddenly become 4D STO, would this not only move the problem (disonant souls with a 4D STO world) elsewhere?

This will eventually happen which is fine, but is wishing for it to happen at once loving in itself, wishing for the huge majority of those living here to be gone and deny their right to live in this world?

Personally, I'd want to move myself to a different world before wanting one to be different.

[Minyatur]

Well, no one seems to care so much about the sufferings of plants even so I don't see us moving away from consuming other life forms any time soon.

Of course, I think eating plants is just as disturbing as eating animals. Fruit is the way to go.

You go on a fruit-only diet?

But then again what are the purpose of fruits in themselves toward themselves? If it is to spread their own lifeform through the seeds, eating them is still a denial of that.

But yeah, ultimately plants/animals both are growth and destruction of lifeforms for our own purposes.

[ree]

In that case we ought not eat animals, plants, fruits, and microbes.. they deserve better than to 'join' our human body complex to work together....  Starvation is the way to be harvestable.

lol gets absurd. 

[Minyatur]

In that case we ought not eat animals, plants, fruits, and microbes.. they deserve better than to 'join' our human body complex to work together....  Starvation is the way to be harvestable.

lol gets absurd. 

Well you don't need to be a 100% positively polarized to harvest.

[ree]

In that case we ought not eat animals, plants, fruits, and microbes.. they deserve better than to 'join' our human body complex to work together....  Starvation is the way to be harvestable.

lol gets absurd. 

Well you don't need to be a 100% positively polarized to harvest.

Fine, 49% of the time, kill an animal, plant, fruit, or microbe. 

You're missing the absurdity

[Minyatur]

In that case we ought not eat animals, plants, fruits, and microbes.. they deserve better than to 'join' our human body complex to work together....  Starvation is the way to be harvestable.

lol gets absurd. 

Well you don't need to be a 100% positively polarized to harvest.

Fine, 49% of the time, kill an animal, plant, fruit, or microbe. 

You're missing the absurdity

Well in higher densities where a much higher positive polarity is reachable, it might be seen as all the same, fueling your vessel with other-selves.

But yeah ultimately, Creation and Destruction are both Love, so it matters not as much as some wish to make it seem.

[Jade]

Well, no one seems to care so much about the sufferings of plants even so I don't see us moving away from consuming other life forms any time soon.

Of course, I think eating plants is just as disturbing as eating animals. Fruit is the way to go.

You go on a fruit-only diet?

But then again what are the purpose of fruits in themselves toward themselves? If it is to spread their own lifeform through the seeds, eating them is still a denial of that.

But yeah, ultimately plants/animals both are growth and destruction of lifeforms for our own purposes.

Seeds travel mostly undigested through our systems and therefore the frugivore is a vehicle for the parent tree to get its spawn further away than directly under the canopy of the parent.

There are many plants that are not fruits that do not need to be destroyed/killed to be harvested/consumed. This cannot be said for any animal. Even milk and eggs require death or just absence of life to be consumed in our culture for the most part.

Speaking of frugivores, our closest genetic relatives (chimps, bonobos, apes) are considered frugivorous and less than 5% of their diet is meat. That 1% difference in the human genome must be a sequence that makes meat eating a requisite.

[outerheaven]

Honestly I think fasting out of respect for all other life forms would be a pretty fast and easy way to polarize positively and end your incarnation. As ridiculous as that might sound.

I think eating anything absolutely is a service to the self. It is the consumption of a life form, or potential life form, for the propagation of your own. (Not to say that you can't be energized by that STS act, to then turn around and do more good in the world by serving others.)

Remember that "Eating Tomatoes is STS" thread? Well, people laughed it off for being "absurd," but I laughed it off for another reason completely: of course eating tomatoes is a STS!

I realize every time I eat, I am making a conscious decision to continue my incarnation at the expense of other life forms. That's why blessing and thanking my food is important to me.

I think the most important thing is that people have given their thoughts and feelings on diet/health/etc adequate examination. The most important thing, IMO, is that your diet is in harmony with your thoughts.

I eat very little meat because of my perspective -- only fish I catch (and I throw back nearly all of them, so that's very rare) and wild deer/turkey/geese when they're in season, occasionally chicken when my friend gives me some of his. I don't buy meat because I eat so little of it and the meat industry scares the heck out of me.

I don't really care if people eat meat, personally. Certainly I wish we had more of a connection with nature, to understand that meat is not just a food item, and thus have more respect/reverence for the life form from which it came ... but ... ya know. This just isn't a battle of mine. I'm working with what I've got and I've already got a plate full of distortions and hang-ups in other areas of life.

[Monica]

In that case we ought not eat animals, plants, fruits, and microbes.. they deserve better than to 'join' our human body complex to work together....  Starvation is the way to be harvestable.

lol gets absurd. 

Animals have pain receptors, a nervous system, free will, individual sentience, and complex emotions.

Plants don't have any of those. They do have some sort of consciousness, to be sure, but none of the above.

Fruits are the ultimate karma-free food.

Microbes aren't killed when we inhale them. Our bodies are in fact 90% microbes! and only 10% human tissue! So we are the natural habitat of microbes.

There's no reason to starve.

...

[Monica]

I get that the corporatized farms would say something like this. What I don't get is that some Bring4th members - self-professed 6D Wanderers - would say this! Yes, over the course of this ongoing discussion, some people here have said essentially the same thing: How do we know the animals don't want to be killed and eaten? numerous times. It boggles the mind!


  Pigs.jpg (Size: 78.17 KB / Downloads: 6)

[Aion]

The fact that plants are capable of being third-density makes it apparent to me that though they do not possess the same type of physical structures I do believe they have many of the same functions. Maybe they don't have a nervous system like humans but that doesn't mean they have no sensitivity or that they don't feel pain. They have all the potentials of second density as second density animals.

I am so confused by this approach that separates plants and animals. They are both second density, they are both capable of progressing to third-density and beyond, so why is the fact that their bodies not like ours conclude they do not experience any of the same faculties? I just can't get behind that.

[Diana]

The fact that plants are capable of being third-density makes it apparent to me that though they do not possess the same type of physical structures I do believe they have many of the same functions. Maybe they don't have a nervous system like humans but that doesn't mean they have no sensitivity or that they don't feel pain. They have all the potentials of second density as second density animals.

I am so confused by this approach that separates plants and animals. They are both second density, they are both capable of progressing to third-density and beyond, so why is the fact that their bodies not like ours conclude they do not experience any of the same faculties? I just can't get behind that.

I don't think you are really getting what, at least I, am trying to say. I am only making a distinction of what to choose based on what I actually know. I agree with the above bolded statement. But this is conjecture only. I KNOW animals don't want to die, that they suffer. I KNOW that plants don't die when they are pruned, or when their fruits are taken, etc. That is not to say that it's not possible that plants suffer as we do even though they don't have the same nervous systems. But we have perception for a reason; we use our sense perceptions to assess and make choices. Extra senses of course matter, but no one I have ever known of can claim to KNOW that plants suffer as we, and animals, do in the same way. 

So when I have to make a choice of what to eat, can you not see the desire to proceed from what I know; to choose from what I know, to recognize cruelty and suffering and the desire of the other as I literally see and hear it? Is it not my responsibility as a conscious being to make choices and decisions based on what I perceive (and I do realize the limitations of that but what else do we have to go by as we evolve?), rather than what I wish things to be (like Christians do) or what I might philosophize about ignoring what I perceive?

Occam's Razor ... what makes more sense: 

1. That what we can observe about plant life is really not the reality and that plants, although they don't appear to nor do they have the same physiology in order to do so (even though they exist on the same planet within the same conditions and derive from the same evolutionary pool), suffer and fear death and don't want to be used for food even though they often depend upon animals eating their parts and speeding their seeds? (I am not discounting that plants as a life form would have survival instincts particular to them as all life does—for example, bees and other insects with a hive mind sacrifice themselves for the good of the whole, so their survival instinct is not individuated as animals' and humans' are).

or, 2. That there is a distinct difference between 2D plant and 2D animal life in regards to suffering and dying, based on what we can observe, and what we know.

In any case, I see no efficacy in making decisions based on wishful thinking or conjecture that ignores OBVIOUS suffering. I totally get that there is a bigger picture and that all life is worthy of life. But when it comes to making a necessary choice, are we to ignore everything we see here in favor of what we think it might be? Perhaps. 

[Diana]

I would like to add one more thing. Many here have conjectured that animals have agreed to our food relationship and the suffering they undergo on our behalf.

But doesn't it make infinitely more sense that that is what plants have done, rather than animals, if it was done at all? And that eating animals is just what's left over from 2D predator/prey behavior, which, because there is a blurry rather than clear demarcation line between 2D and 3D behaviors, is still being acted out in 3D?

[Aion]

Okay, it doesn't make more sense from my perspective. I don't think either have any form of contract or agreement to be consumed per se however they are involved in the conditions of the vibration of their density. There are conditions that are involved with incarnation that have been agreed to.

However, I would make the point that as I understand it the entity does not choose consciously the elements of its incarnation but rather lives are organized by guardians whom attempt to situate them so they can make the progression from second to third density.

So, it then seems a little strange to me that such guardians would allow and create so many second density lives under conditions of suffering, plant and animal alike. I realized however that there were density laws that had to be fulfilled. For example, they can't just stop incarnating animals so that no more bodies that experience suffering can be created because there are planetary karmic patterns at play which tie them in to a particular theme or leitmotif, as Ra might say, of experience. In this way, I see the planet as exploring itself.

I really do see what you are saying, it's just that my own experience has informed me differently as to the appropriate position to approach from. I see plants and animals as equal, I see both as having potential and capability for higher being, and I see it that I have to take energy in to this body for it to operate in this density. I don't think anything is automatically designated 'food', I think that is a description of something much more basic.

I do not view my fellow selves as food, the food is the energy. This has been an increasing issue for me lately and it is worrying my girlfriend because I am having a hard time eating. I have no appetites. However when I do crave it is almost always for meats, salts, proteins (I don't feel at all satisfied by just nuts) and a huge wave of guilt because I had somehow built it in to my philosophy that that was fundamentally evil. I am realizing it is functional.

I have a lot of issues with vital energy for the last bit of time as I have seemingly attempted to 'dehumanise' myself to be more accepted in the eyes of apparent compassion. I'm beginning to see however that I've been having an enormous repression within myself because of these rules and expectations I have had for myself that I, and this is absolutely key to my point, do NOT actually believe in in my heart.

I realized that I have been so heavily swayed by others' justifications that I have constantly been trying to suppress what I actually feel is true and natural.

I see your logic, I see your love and compassion, I assure you, I see from your eyes, but I ask, can you see from mine?

[Monica]

The fact that plants are capable of being third-density makes it apparent to me that though they do not possess the same type of physical structures I do believe they have many of the same functions.

Only very rarely, such as ancient trees. Do you really think that a carrot has an opportunity to develop sentience to the point of being harvestable to 3D?

Ra stated that 2D is a very long density. Let's use some common sense here. It seems readily apparent to me that plants are early 2D, and animals are higher 2D.

I think that Law of One students err in using the density as the demarcation; ie., classifying plants and animals together, with humans elevated above them. Simple observation shows that cows have much more in common with humans, than with carrots!

The 2D/3D classification is really rather arbitrary.

Maybe they don't have a nervous system like humans but that doesn't mean they have no sensitivity or that they don't feel pain.

Actually it does. Having pain receptors = the ability to feel pain. That's what pain receptors are.  

They have all the potentials of second density as second density animals.

They really don't. The soul chooses the appropriate body based on its consciousness. Do you really think that a sentient being would incarnate into the body of a lettuce?

Do You really think that a lettuce is writhing in agony every time you tear off a leaf? Is your grass moaning in pain every time you walk on it? Are you torturing your lawn when you mow it?

If that were true, then our planet would be even more cruel than we thought! It would be an absolutely hideous place!

I am so confused by this approach that separates plants and animals. They are both second density,

If Ra hadn't told us that they were both 2D, we wouldn't even be having this conversation. Simple observation shows us that animals are capable of pain, rational thought, strategic thought, friendship, love, and complex emotions, as well as building complex social structures. Were it not for Ra's statement about them being 2D, it would be obvious that they are more like humans than they are like plants.

I contend that there has been a gross misinterpretation of Ra's words. I contend that it's a mistake to assume that animals are more like plants than like humans, just because they are still classified as 2D. I contend that they are nearer to humans than to plants, and nearing the threshold of crossing over to 3D, just as humans are nearer to our 4D elders than we are to cavemen.

The criteria for 4D is love, and 3D humans do demonstrate love. Likewise, animals do demonstrate sentience, with is the criteria for 3D. It's a process. Animals are fine-tuning their sentience until they have enough to be harvested, just as humans are fine-tuning their love until they have enough to be harvested.

they are both capable of progressing to third-density and beyond, so why is the fact that their bodies not like ours conclude they do not experience any of the same faculties? I just can't get behind that.

Let's hope they don't. Because if they do, then that would mean that our Logos is a sadistic, cruel monster.

[Diana]

Aion, I'm going to consider your post above and get back with you later. I have to get a job done this afternoon and I don't want to post a hasty and unthought-out reply.

[Aion]

The fact that plants are capable of being third-density makes it apparent to me that though they do not possess the same type of physical structures I do believe they have many of the same functions.

Only very rarely, such as ancient trees. Do you really think that a carrot has an opportunity to develop sentience to the point of being harvestable to 3D?

Ra stated that 2D is a very long density. Let's use some common sense here. It seems readily apparent to me that plants are early 2D, and animals are higher 2D.

I think that Law of One students err in using the density as the demarcation; ie., classifying plants and animals together, with humans elevated above them. Simple observation shows that cows have much more in common with humans, than with carrots!

The 2D/3D classification is really rather arbitrary.

Maybe they don't have a nervous system like humans but that doesn't mean they have no sensitivity or that they don't feel pain.

Actually it does. Having pain receptors = the ability to feel pain. That's what pain receptors are.  

They have all the potentials of second density as second density animals.

They really don't. The soul chooses the appropriate body based on its consciousness. Do you really think that a sentient being would incarnate into the body of a lettuce?

Do You really think that a lettuce is writhing in agony every time you tear off a leaf? Is your grass moaning in pain every time you walk on it? Are you torturing your lawn when you mow it?

If that were true, then our planet would be even more cruel than we thought! It would be an absolutely hideous place!

I am so confused by this approach that separates plants and animals. They are both second density,

If Ra hadn't told us that they were both 2D, we wouldn't even be having this conversation. Simple observation shows us that animals are capable of pain, rational thought, strategic thought, friendship, love, and complex emotions, as well as building complex social structures. Were it not for Ra's statement about them being 2D, it would be obvious that they are more like humans than they are like plants.

I contend that there has been a gross misinterpretation of Ra's words. I contend that it's a mistake to assume that animals are more like plants than like humans, just because they are still classified as 2D. I contend that they are nearer to humans than to plants, and nearing the threshold of crossing over to 3D, just as humans are nearer to our 4D elders than we are to cavemen.

The criteria for 4D is love, and 3D humans do demonstrate love. Likewise, animals do demonstrate sentience, with is the criteria for 3D. It's a process. Animals are fine-tuning their sentience until they have enough to be harvested, just as humans are fine-tuning their love until they have enough to be harvested.

they are both capable of progressing to third-density and beyond, so why is the fact that their bodies not like ours conclude they do not experience any of the same faculties? I just can't get behind that.

Let's hope they don't. Because if they do, then that would mean that our Logos is a sadistic, cruel monster.

The only thing I can say in love is that I disagree with many of your interpretations and what you seem to deem as scientifically demonstrated I am still quite skeptical of. I don't think our views can be reconciled except on the point that we both see it that suffering is unnecessary.

I will say that I believe there is much more plant life that is close to third density than you seem to believe and that is my own belief. I don't think it is imbalances between plants and animals. I think the nature of the experience of plant life is just hard to understand from the position of animal life.

[Monica]

I would like to add one more thing. Many here have conjectured that animals have agreed to our food relationship and the suffering they undergo on our behalf.

But doesn't it make infinitely more sense that that is what plants have done, rather than animals, if it was done at all? And that eating animals is just what's left over from 2D predator/prey behavior, which, because there is a blurry rather than clear demarcation line between 2D and 3D behaviors, is still being acted out in 3D?

Exactly! I am amazed that the same people saying animals want to be killed and eaten, then turn around and say that plants don't want to be eaten.

It makes more sense to me (based on simple observation) that plants do indeed want to be eaten! They are so obviously designed to be eaten!

They don't die when parts of them are harvested, but just keep growing back.

Their seeds are propagated when animals consume them.

They don't have the physiology to experience pain.

They don't have the physiology to flee from predators.

They feed all animal life, whether directly or indirectly.

They contain all the nutrients needed by the human body.

They are known to heal the human body from the diseases caused by animal 'foods'.

These are clues!

Whereas, we KNOW that animals don't want to be killed! There is NO question about that.

...

[Aion]

I KNOW plants don't want to be eaten by communing with them myself. They are eaten because you want to eat them. You even said yourself that fruits are the only karmic-free food but then you try to justify eating plant life? It's so hypocritical.

You act like you are the only one who has done any research or connecting or consideration. It's infuriating and yes that is on me, but I am torn between love and wanting to commune to you and feeling like I am somehow disgusting to you simply because I do not have the same beliefs. You act like you understand but you don't because you can't possibly, it's not of the nature of our density.

[Aion]

"Forgive them, Father, they know not what they do."

I will just have to dwell in thankfulness and forgiveness I think to see there is a great pattern occuring and a knot that is slowly being untangled in our planetary mind.

[Aion]

I think I can only conclude that I do not understand the nature of our need to consume life at this time and I do not understand the exact nature of why you and I seemingly have come to completely different conclusions.

[Monica]

I KNOW plants don't want to be eaten by communing with them myself. They are eaten because you want to eat them.

I commune with them too. I've been growing my own sprouts for 33 years, and gardening for 5 years. I love my plants. I perceive them as being excited when I harvest leaves. In fact, it's so funny...I continue to marvel how my lettuces and weeds (such as purslane, nettles, etc.) seem to proliferate more when I pick them.

I've even experimented. I've tried not harvesting any purslane for several days, and the plants stay about the same size. Well they might grow just a bit, but not much. Then I'll harvest about 1/2 of the plant and I'm not kidding you, the next day the plant has doubled in size! It's almost like they are gleefully inviting me to harvest more!

So...who is right? Me or you?

Neither of us can say. Maybe I'm wrong and completely misinterpreting the vibes I'm getting from my plants. Let's explore that possibility.

If I am wrong in my perceptions and you are right, then what do we do about it? Being that we must eat something while visiting this planet?

So, there's a 50/50 chance you are right and a 50/50 chance I am right.

I might be wrong about plants.

BUT, there is a 100% certainty that I'm right about animals feeling pain and fear, and fighting to escape the killer.

Furthermore, even IF you are right about plants, then that is all the more reason to quit eating animals, because by eating animals, you are killing MORE plants!!! Because the animals must first eat plants! and they eat a lot of plants to produce only a small amount of meat!

So it's really Not a question of eating animals vs. plants. It's a question of eating only some plants vs eating a lot MORE plants by eating the animals who eat the plants.

You even said yourself that fruits are the only karmic-free food but then you try to justify eating plant life?

I said that several years ago and I no longer think that. I completely retract that statement. I no longer believe there is any karma whatsoever in harvesting plants, because my gardening experience over the past few years has brought me into closer communion with plants and I just don't perceive that from them.

The exception is plants that are mass-produced in conventional monoculture farms. There is NO LOVE in that kind of farming! NO farmer lovingly tending his plants, but workers spraying them with toxic chemicals, and no one ever gives thanks, and the plants are harvested violently instead of lovingly, with machines. There isn't any ecosystem at all, but a place of death.

Now, you might say, "But a farmer can lovingly harvest his cows too!" to which I would reply: Rubbish! NO cow ever wants to be killed. If anything, the cow feels betrayed by his 'loving' caretaker suddenly turning on him! Think about what happens when a trusted adult suddenly molests a child. Betrayal!

Fruit is definitely 100% karma-free. Nothing is killed when fruit is harvested.

But again, even IF there is some karma in eating plants, then it logically follows that there is a lot MORE karma in eating animals, aside from the karma of killing the animals themselves, because meat-eaters kill MORE plants because the animals ate a lot of plants! More plants are killed to produce meat, than just eating the plants themselves.  

It's so hypocritical.

Um...no. Hypocrisy is saying one thing and doing another. 

You act like you are the only one who has done any research or connecting or consideration. It's infuriating and yes that is on me, but I am torn between love and wanting to commune to you and feeling like I am somehow disgusting to you simply because I do not have the same beliefs.

You aren't disgusting to me at all! I actually like you!    I do find the idea of eating animals disgusting yes, but that doesn't mean I find you as a person disgusting. If I thought every person who ate animals disgusting, then I wouldn't be able to have friendships with most people! since most people eat animals.

Gosh, at least I'll never have to kiss you. 

You act like you understand but you don't because you can't possibly, it's not of the nature of our density.

Well, I feel that I do understand why mainstream people have a hard time with this. It's due to social conditioning. They've been brought up eating meat and dairy and it's just normal to them. There's still a very strong societal bias in favor of eating meat/dairy and it's very difficult to disentangle from that collective consciousness. So yes, I do understand, actually.

I do admit that I have a hard time understanding how self-professed 'spiritual' people - many claiming to be 6D Wanderers - don't seem to grasp this. That perplexes me. Meanwhile, many people who've never read the Law of One 'get it' very quickly.

Just because it's not the density of understanding doesn't mean we can't understand anything. Else, why would Ra have bothered to give us this info in the first place?  :idea:

...

[Aion]

They said themselves they gave it to inspire and that realizing that one doesn't understand is necessary for harvest to Fourth positive. I wasn't 'raised mainstream', I was just raised with a respect and gratitude for sustenance and it seems you only want to sidestep my philosophy. That is fine, I've realized that really the catalyst here for me is that I need to accept you as you are without wanting to change you and I think I do now.

I will, however, offer a theory as to our differences in experience and I would relate it to the way we each 'crystallize' differently. You enable your plants to have such an experience through your offerings and these are thoughts worth considering as I see myself administering to perhaps a different level or aspect of plants than you. Will consider further.

[Monica]

I think I can only conclude that I do not understand the nature of our need to consume life at this time

We'll have to ask the Logos that one.

In the meantime, my own experience (which, I realize, is different from yours) is that plant life doesn't die when we consume it. Rather, its consciousness merges with ours. It's just a different kind of consciousness. It's more primal and amorphous.

Whereas, animals are individuated.

I do not understand the exact nature of why you and I seemingly have come to completely different conclusions.

I don't either. In an effort to understand you better, what do you perceive when you step on a blade of grass? Do you perceive it writhing in agony? If, as you say, plants are close to 3D, then where are the boundaries of the individual entities? We are all One, yes, but you are still you and I am still me too. A dog is a dog, with his/her own personality...clearly there is an individuated entity residing in that dog's body. Same with cows, chickens, pigs, etc.

Where, then, does the grass soul reside? Where is the mind/body/spirit complex? Oh, it doesn't have one yet? Where, then, is its mind/body complex? If you tear off a few leaves from a lettuce plant, is each leaf an individual, sentient entity? What happens when you take a cutting from a plant and it grows into a new plant? Like, say, a co-worker gives you a cutting from her ivy, and you plant it at home, 10 miles from the office. Did that ivy turn into 2 mind/body complexes? How did this happen? Were there 2 souls to begin with? or was there only 1 soul originally...and if so, where did the 2nd soul come from?

If you are arguing that plants are sentient, individuated entities, then maybe you can explain what happens when you grow 2 ivy plants from a single cutting. Or, 20 cuttings! The lady in the office has a huge ivy and gives away 20 cuttings, and 20 other people take their cuttings home and grow 20 new ivy plants.

That is reproduction, you might say. Maybe...though reproduction means that a new body is created. That's Not what happened here, because the original cutting was part of the Ivy #1's own body!

That would be like cutting off someone's arm and it growing into a new human body, while still retaining the original body part (the arm) from the original person's body.

Do you see how crazy this gets?

It's kinda like those people who say men and women are exactly the same. Um, no they're not. Their plumbing is different! There might be all sorts of gender issues, etc. but the fact remains that the plumbing is...different.

It is the same with plants and animals. Animals have a different physiology...for a reason! I contend that it's because they have reached the point of developed sentience.

They have the ability to fly, swim or run away...for a reason. The reason being that they are sentient enough to have developed free will and the will to live. Plants aren't mobile for a reason...they don't need to be, because they aren't harmed when parts of them are torn off. They simply grow back. Even if the whole corn stalk is killed, when you think in terms of amorphous consciousness, the whole field of corn losing a single stalk is kinda like a human losing a fingernail.

Yes, they do have consciousness! No doubt about it. Plant a field of corn and spray it with toxic chemicals and then violently chop it all down, when it never even got a chance to live a decent life with bugs, and yeah, of course the group soul is going to protest. How could it not? But that doesn't mean that every stalk of corn is an individuated entity. It's more like the whole field of corn is an entity...with each stalk of corn sort of like a fingernail on the body of a sentient entity.

Did you know that science has shown evidence that the body of bacteria is spread out all over the entire planet? When bacteria in, say, Tokyo suddenly developed resistance to a certain antibiotic, simultaneously other bacteria in test tubes developed the same resistance across the world in, say, Chicago. After years of no resistance, all the bacteria became resistant, even the bacteria in test tubes, totally cut off physically from other bacteria.

The logical conclusion to this is that it has a group mind...a collective consciousness.

Life on Planet Earth has evolved from the primal/amorphous TO the individuated. Now, having come full circle, to evolve further we must take our individual consciousness and merge it with other individuals to form a Social Memory Complex.

In the meantime, there are degrees and stages that the consciousness goes through. Plants are somewhere in-between the primal, amorphous existence of bacteria, and the higher, self-contained, physically demarcated animals, whereas animals are in-between the less amorphous but still somewhat amorphous plants and...humans.

This is what seems obvious to me. But of course, I could be wrong. Maybe you are right and there is absolutely no rhyme or reason to any of it, and all the vegetation on the planet is living a life of agony.

If that's the case, then this planet is HELL.

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