生态系统的神经网络：森林智能的底层逻辑
通过对森林下方地下连接的研究，我们发现了一种类似于生物神经网络（biological neural network）的模式。在这种模式中，树木在资源传输中具有主体性，这些属性暗示了一种智能的存在。这种网络的核心是菌根系统（mycorrhizal system: 真菌与根系的共生关联）。菌根网络中的真菌网丝不仅连接着不同的树木和植物，更充当了树木间的“电话线”。
通过这个网络，树木能够实时发送复杂的化学信息，以响应彼此的需求与环境变化。而在地下连接之外，树木也通过空气进行交流。我们可以闻到森林中的树脂气息，这些信息化学物质（infochemicals）包含着有关传粉、压力状态的信号，甚至像是萜烯（terpen: 一类树木释放的、兼具警告功能的信息化学物质）这样的昆虫预警信号。
我们在分析这些网络的数学模式时发现，其结构与人脑的连接方式惊人相似——拥有少数几个大型核心节点，以及大量小型连接节点。此外，该网络中进行信息传输的主要化学物质是谷氨酸（glutamate），这同时也是人类大脑中最常见的神经递质。因此，这种森林系统本身的功能运作，就像是一个高度智能的系统。
Original English Source
My colleagues and I found that the belowground linkages had patterns suggestive of a biological neural network that the trees have agency in the transmission of resources and that together these properties are suggestive of a type of intelligence. Well, so this biological neural network is really this this network or this web of these mcelium which is part of the microisal system. So a microisa is a fungus root association. Microisa literally means fungus root. That web um you know there's all kinds of compounds that are moving through that web of hy all the time. And the web can actually link up trees together. It can link plants together and trees together depending on the species that are involved. But that serves kind of like a a pathway or like a telephone line from tree to tree. And so the the trees then can send messages to each other. And those messages can include simple things like amino acids u or sugars or they can be information chemicals that are far more complex than that. and they are sending these messages in response to each other's needs to their presence what's happening with them. Um so there's this constant back and forth going on through this microisal network. It's also going on through the soil and I would say just to expand things a little bit there's also communication going on through the air. Ooh. Okay. So, there's all these infochemicals going back. You can actually smell them when you're in the forest, right? What's the smell? That resiny smell or that bouquet. Um, and those are trees that are communicating with each other about pollination or, you know, whether they're under stress. Um, you know, they're emanating things like tarpen that that are also sort of like insect warning signals. And so there there is this constant conversation above and below ground between these trees and plants in the forest which which feels like a form of intelligence. And so the you know when we looked at these microisal networks and we actually we made maps of them and we analyzed the mathematical pattern of the linkages and they followed a what's called a biological neural network pattern. Okay. So they would look like the connections in your brain. They do where you've got a few really large nodes and lots of little connecting nodes like that's what we have in our brains as well, right? And then you have these linkages where you're having this transmission of information, the main chemical that's moving through the microisal network is is a compound called glutamate. Glutamate is also the most common neurotransmitter in our brains. And so when I said it it's a form of intelligence, I'm I'm really talking about the physical structure and the physicality of the movement of information, the compounds, but it's also, you know, that that the forest itself functions like an intelligent system.竞争的误区：森林中的资源互助舞步
在我的研究生涯早期，林业部门的任务是清除生态系统中的白桦（birch），因为林业行业专注于“竞争”理念，即必须消除对针叶树的竞争。然而，我观察到，当我们清除白桦后，道格拉斯冷杉（Douglas fir）反而变病了。这表明森林中发生的远不止竞争。
为了验证这一假设，我进行了博士实验，以白桦、冷杉以及另一种邻近树种雪松（cedar）为研究对象。我利用碳14和碳13（carbon 13/14: 不同同位素的碳，用于追踪物质移动）标记了树木，追踪资源路径。结果发现，碳元素在白桦与冷杉之间往复流动。更为惊人的是，当我模拟遮蔽实验来模拟“白桦夺取冷杉光照”的竞争环境时，我发现白桦对冷杉的遮蔽越严重，它反而向冷杉输送了越多的碳。这完全颠覆了“白桦仅是竞争者”的假设。实际上，即便在遮蔽冷杉的同时，白桦也在促进冷杉的生长。这证明树木之间存在着协作的舞蹈，对整个森林群落而言，两者共同繁荣显然更有益。
Original English Source
Yeah, so I was working in forests that I had worked in for a long long time and as a forest researcher, I was, you know, I was working for the Ministry of Forest in British Columbia at the time and I was tasked with how to get rid of birch from these ecosystems. Yeah. And, you know, it was at a time when the the the forest industry and it still is, is focused on this idea of competition. you got to get rid of the competition for the conifers. And so, and I started seeing that that when we did that that the the Douglas furs when we got rid of the birches were getting sick. And so, I was interested in well, what there's more going on here than just competition. So, I set up for my doctoral experiment birch and fur and a neighbor cedar. Uh, and birch and fur share many microisal species in common and therefore can be linked together. Cedar forms another kind of microisa called an arbuscular microisa and therefore has its other networks going on here. Yeah, we've got a couple of clicks here. The cedar is not part of the clique. So I wanted to see whether or not birch and fur were in communication through these microisal networks or through the soil or whatever other avenue might might be happening. And so I set up this experiment where I grew these triplets together. And I labeled the Douglas fur with carbon 14 and the paper birch with carbon 13, a different isotope of carbon. And then I traced where those isotopes went. And what I found is it moved from birch to fur and from fur to birch. So it was going back and forth actually between the two trees. And then I did another thing is that I shaded Douglas fur with trying to emulate this idea that the foresters had was well you know birch is going to shade Douglas fur and it's going to kill the fur right so I thought oh I'll shade it I'll shade Douglas fur you know sort of emulating the competition for light and what I found which was amazing is that the more I shaded Douglas fur the more carbon birch sent to fur. Okay. So this is real time communication. Yes it is. And it also totally upsets their hypothesis that birch is only a competitor, right? What birch is doing is it's facilitating fur even as it's shading it. So they really are in this dance together, you know, for and I kind of interpreted that that it's better for the whole community if they're both thriving, right?家族联结与化学防御：森林的生存协作
通过菌根网络的研究，我们发现那些最大、最古老的树木（我们称之为“母树”）在网络中具有最高连通性。我的学生们实验证明，那些能够接入由这些老树支撑的网络的幼苗，生存率更高。这引出了一个问题：母树是否能识别出自己的后代并给予更多照顾？
我们在实验中培育了“亲属”（kin）幼苗和“陌生”（stranger）幼苗。结果表明，亲属幼苗拥有更大的根系、更多的芽和更高的生长速度。通过追踪碳13的移动，我们发现在亲属幼苗之间有更多的资源转移，且这些碳最终落入了亲属幼苗的菌根中，切实提升了它们的生存能力。这说明森林中存在亲属识别（kin recognition）现象，家族联结确实影响生存。
此外，树木不仅共享资源，还会发送警告信号。在对西部云杉芽虫（western spruce budworm）的实验中，当受感染的道格拉斯冷杉开始产生防御酶时，它会通过菌根网络向邻近的西黄松（ponderosa pine）发送信号。邻近的松树在“聆听”后，也上调了自己的防御酶产量，从而增强了对虫害的抵抗力。
Original English Source
Yeah. So, let I'll I'll sort of step a little bit back and talk about how we got to this question in the first place. Yeah. So, the microisal network is in the forest. And so, the next step was to we wanted to map what these microisal networks looked like. And you know, I mentioned that it looks like a biological neural network with some big nodes and lots of little nodes. And so, those big nodes were the big old trees. So the biggest and oldest the tree, the more highly connected they were to all the other trees. And so then I started saying, well, what are these big old trees doing? Um, and so we started looking at how regeneration happens around the old trees. First, I just did some experiments with my students where we would grow seed like any old seed of a Douglas fur or seedling connected to the network or not connected to the network. And we found that those that could tap into the network that was supported by these big old trees, those survived better. Okay, so that's cool. So that means that the these old trees are facilitating regeneration. So then the next question is, can they tell which ones are their own offspring? Would they benefit those ones even more? So we did a bunch of elaborate experiments with with my grad students especially Amanda Eay was very instrumental in doing this work and we grew kin seedlings and stranger seedlings. So kin meaning that they were from the seed of the parent tree and then a stranger from other trees that were nearby but not of the same the same parentage. And we grew those with and without networks next to these mother trees. And we found that the that the kin seedlings got had bigger root systems. They had um more fitness traits, more more buds, more uh height growth. And importantly, we we traced carbon 13 moving from a sibling to a a to another sibling and we found that more moved to the kin. Um and it that carbon ended up in the microises of the kin seedlings. So that also benefited them. Wow. So, Family Matters in the forest. Family Matters. Kin recognition happens. Um, you mentioned uh sending signals through the air and I remember watching this, I think it was a planet Earth documentary, and it had the this type of monkeys. I think they were vervet monkeys and they would send each other warning sounds based on if it was a snake or an eagle. And it was this, you know, really aha moment for people of, oh, there's a lot of intelligence going on here. Can trees do the same thing? Do they send each other warning signals? They So, they do. And and I'm not the only one who's looked at this, but I'll tell you about what I've done with my with my group is that we we grew Douglas furs and ponderosa pines. So in British Columbia, these are two important species. They're they're at the lower uh reach of the tree line but in valley bottoms. And we started testing whether or not the Douglas fur and pine were in conversation or had a warning signal when they were being attacked by in this case by western spruce budworm. And keeping in mind that those forests have been under a lot of stress from the mountain pine beetle, western spruce buttworm outbreaks and these are getting more amplified as climate is changing. So it's important to know how these trees are responding. So we grew ponderrosa pine and douglas fur in the lab. you know that they normally grow side by side and we infected the Douglas fur with western spruce budworm and then traced its you know its physiology and its uh production of defense enzymes which it immediately started to produce and then it sends signals through its microisal network to the neighboring ponderosa pine which is listening and it upregulated its defense enzyme production and it increased its defense against the budworm. So they were in communication and they were, you know, it was helping the neighbors be more resistant to the infection.重构自然观：超越人类中心的时间尺度
如果我们将上述行为置于动物或哺乳动物身上，我们无疑会断言它们具有智能甚至意识。那么，森林智能与动物智能的核心区别是什么？我认为除了缺乏大脑，主要的差别在于时间尺度（time scale）。
我们对“通信”和“智能”的定义带有明显的偏见，将其局限于人类期待的“网球赛”式的即时反馈。而森林的运行则不然。树木寿命极长，经历着长达数百乃至三千年的时间维度，但它们同时也以微观的、微生物群落（microbiome）的尺度进行极速响应。一棵树实际上是一个由真菌、细菌和病毒组成的多种生物共同体。这意味着它们既能在长周期内进行适应，也能在实时动态中保持极高的感知力。
西方科学长期将植物视为惰性的、背景式的“景物”，这源于我们自身与自然界的脱离——将心智与身体、人与自然进行了二分。这种割裂使得我们极其容易将植物客体化。然而，正如我们对科学认知的类比：有些人站在池塘涟漪的中心，认为一切皆已可知；而像爱因斯坦这样的科学家，则站在涟漪的边缘，看到的是广袤的未知领域。理解地球是一个活体系统、人类与之处于一种相互的（ reciprocal）而非不互惠的关系中，这并不需要爱因斯坦级别的天才，只需要走出自我中心，重新将自身置于这个庞大的智能 scaffold（脚手架）之中。