Welcome to "Harmony"—the New Nautilus Issue

Plants Feel Pain and Might Even See [View this email in your browser]( [Nautilus logo]( Thursday, July 22, 2021 Chapter One: Earth Dear Nautilus Reader, Our new issue, Harmony, begins with the article “Plants Feel Pain and Might Even See.” It’s written by Peter Wohlleben, author of the best-selling The Hidden Life of Trees. Wohlleben relates an experiment in which Venus flytraps are given an anesthetic that deactivates their electric activity and they can’t snap their traps shut. When the plants “wake up,” all is well, and they are back to snatching flies. But to wake up, writes Wohlleben, you need consciousness. So do plants have consciousness? Wohlleben leans toward answering “Yes.” But his main argument is that biological classifications should be relegated to history’s dustbin. All species of plants and animals, including us, are interrelated. All life is an ecological dance. Sometimes in harmony, sometimes not, but always interrelated. That’s the theme that guides this issue. It’s about our interconnections with nature and with our technologies, as you will read in “Reports of a Baleful Internet Are Greatly Exaggerated.” Harmony of course evokes music, and we venture there too, specifically into science labs where music is under the microscope. We also chart the ecology of the deepest layer of the ocean and the forces that feed extreme wildfires. No person is an island, John Donne should have written. But he was right. As science has shown, we are all “A part of the main.” [READ ISSUE]( [Plants Feel Pain and Might Even See]( [It’s time to retire the hierarchical classification of living things.]( [Peter Wohlleben]( [In 2018, a German newspaper asked me if I would be interested in having a conversation with the philosopher Emanuele Coccia, who had just written a book about plants, The Life of Plants.]( BECOME A SUBSCRIBER Subscribe to Nautilus! What will you discover in the latest issue of Nautilus? [Subscribe to Nautilus Print + DigitalNautilus Print + Digital]( by July 28th and get the latest issue delivered to your doorstep. [Subscribe Today!]( [Reports of a Baleful Internet Are Greatly Exaggerated]( [Our digital technologies can in fact be cognitive aids.]( [Brian Gallagher]( [It’s now fashionable, when something has you mildly obsessed, to say that it is “living rent-free in your head.”]( [We’re More of Ourselves When We’re in Tune with Others]( [Music reminds us why going solo goes against our better nature.]( [Kevin Berger]( [When musicians have chemistry, we can feel it. There’s something special among them that’s missing when they perform alone.]( [READ ISSUE]( [Facebook]( [Instagram]( [Twitter]( [Web Site]( Copyright © 2021 NautilusNext, All rights reserved. You were subscribed to the newsletter from [nautil.us](. Our mailing address is: NautilusNext 360 W 36th Street, 7S, New York, NY 10018 Don't want to hear from us anymore? [Click here to unsubscribe.](