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<\/p>\nResearch suggests that consciousness could extend far beyond just humans \u2013 every cellular creature in the universe, no matter how big or small, could be conscious, too.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Studies show that single-cell organisms \u2013 like mould \u2013 display traits associated with cognition, such as counting and collaborating.<\/p>\n
Plants are included in this theory as well; researchers believe plants are aware of their environment, meaning they can recognize others around them.<\/p>\n
Human beings are one of the youngest species \u2013 if Earth\u2019s history was an hour long, we arrived eight seconds ago. Nonetheless, many of us assume that we are the smartest, most conscious beings on Earth.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, phytoplankton emerged over a billion years ago. These are photosynthesizers who live in the water. Most are single-celled plants, but some are bacteria, and others protists. Few people would suggest that these phytoplankton are conscious. Even single-celled beings demonstrate a certain measure of self-awareness.<\/p>\n
So what if consciousness isn\u2019t a feature limited solely to humans \u2013 and what if we\u2019re actually wildly outnumbered by a planet full of other conscious beings?<\/p>\n
As it turns out, a handful of studies suggest that might just be the case. In fact, some researchers believe that every cellular being in the universe, no matter how big or small \u2013 from the simplest prokaryotic cells to entire forests of trees \u2013 may be conscious, since we all share fundamental similarities on a microscopic level.<\/p>\n
In the 1990s, a theory emerged called the Cellular Basis of Consciousness<\/em> (CBC), which states that life and sentience are basically the same. According to the theory, \u201cAll living organisms are conscious, self-aware, and have valenced sensory and perceptual experiences<\/em>.\u201d CBC argues that unicellular prokaryotes \u2013 or the simplest form of unicellular life, such as common bacteria \u2013 engage in associative learning, stable memory formation, route navigation and decision-making. \u201cThey anticipate upcoming events and readily create functional social collectives, within which they display both cooperation and competition and, fascinatingly, a primitive form of altruism where some cells in a colony put themselves at risk to support the life functions of other cells in distress<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n For example, unicellular eukaryotes \u2013 or cells with nuclei \u2013 such as Physarum polycephalum<\/em>, a slime mould known as \u201cthe blob<\/em>,\u201d can solve math problems and find its way out of a maze without chemical inducements like food.<\/p>\n Likewise, there are also bacteria that can sense when there are enough of them to take a collective action. One marine bioluminescent bacterium emits a molecule that stimulates glowing, but only when the bacteria has reached a certain population density. Princeton University molecular biologist Bonnie Lynn Bassler, PhD, says the way bacteria do this is through \u201ctalking, counting, and carrying out tasks in groups<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n The difference between what these unicellular beings experience as consciousness and what humans experience as consciousness, researchers say, is that their version of consciousness would feel to us like intuition rather than a full experience of self.<\/p>\n Plants also count in this theory.<\/p>\n Plant neurobiologist Stefano Mancuso, PhD, notes that plants respond to anaesthesia the same way humans do \u2013 they become nonresponsive. Humans tend to think of plants as nonresponsive anyway, because they don\u2019t generally move in human timescales. But when scientists have administered anaesthesia to plants that do operate \u201cquickly\u201d by human measures, such as the Venus Flytrap<\/em>, the plant stops responding when flies land on them. And while you won\u2019t see a plant fleeing danger the way we do, some have been found to be gradually migrating north as the planet warms, just as animals are changing their migratory patterns.<\/p>\n To test the spatial awareness and intentionality of a bean plant, Mancuso did an experiment, placing a potted bean plant in his lab about a meter from a metal rod. In a time-lapse video, he showed that the bean plant, having reached the top of its support pole, sent out a long, hooked shoot that repeatedly swung out and back, trying to hook the metal pole and eventually catching hold of it. In short: the bean plant \u201cknew\u201d where the pole was. Mancuso also conducted research demonstrating that, when two bean plants reach a support, one recognizes the other plant got there first and begins to look for a different support.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat is interesting is the behaviour of the loser: it immediately sensed the other plant had reached the pole and started to find an alternative<\/em>,\u201d he wrote in the study. \u201cThis was astonishing and it demonstrates the plants were aware of their physical environment and the behaviour of the other plant. In animals we call this consciousness<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n His colleague, Monica Gagliano, PhD, did a series of experiments with mimosas \u2013 a genus often called the \u201csensitive plant<\/em>\u201d because its leaves fold up quickly when touched. She placed the mimosa in a basket and dropped it several inches, causing the mimosa to close its leaves. But after she had repeated this many times, the mimosa seemed to \u201cget used to\u201d the experience and stopped responding when the drop came. She tried the experiment again a few weeks later, and the mimosas still didn\u2019t react to the drop, suggesting that plants can remember.<\/p>\n In 2025, Mancuso worked on a paper led by Tomonori Kawano, PhD. In the article, researchers explored the idea that plants, like people, have an unconscious part that makes quick decisions and a conscious one that makes slower decisions, like humans have. In the case of Gagliano\u2019s mimosas, for example, the more unconscious \u201cthinking\u201d would be to close its leaves when it\u2019s jarred. But by remembering the experience and making a different choice, the mimosa demonstrates a more conscious and deliberate level of \u201cthinking.\u201d<\/p>\n Kawano and the rest of the research team even explored the possibility that single-celled organisms could be found to have consciousness. They say that the factors involved are the same at all levels: biological materials, the flow of energy, and \u201cinformation.\u201d Several other scientists have already proposed a connection between these elements in human consciousness.<\/p>\n Anaesthesiologist Marco Cavagli\u00e1, MD, a researcher at Polytechnic University of Turin, is working on a theory of consciousness that says our cell membranes, vicinal water (a water-like substance around the membranes), and cerebrospinal fluid resonate with Earth\u2019s energy fields. This resonance shapes the matter that forms our brains. Humans use logic \u2013 the brain\u2019s systems of neurochemical and electrical signalling \u2013 to form a narrative about who we are from the interactions with these energy fields.<\/p>\n Other animals and plants have cell membranes and vicinal water as well, though they may not be as inclined to form narratives about their existence. That might be a plus for them, though. Our stories about ourselves are often marred by self-consciousness, comparisons to others, and anxiety \u2013 what Cavagli\u00e1 and his collaborators call our internal noise \u2013 which can interfere with our ability to tap into optimal energy fields.<\/p>\n Quantum energy, rather than electromagnetic energy, has also been proposed as a source of conscious awareness. Quantum theory says there are fields of energy in all directions that are waves of probability that collapse into a particular reality, though no one knows what makes them collapse. Nobel<\/em> laureate Roger Penrose, PhD, and his research partner Stuart Hameroff, MD, believe microtubules \u2013 nanoscopic protein structures inside the cells \u2013 engage with the quantum wave function in a way that causes it to collapse over and over into what we experience as a seamless stream of consciousness.<\/p>\n Microtubules are exceptionally abundant in neurons. But all eukaryotic cells \u2013 including those that make up plants and animals \u2013 have microtubules. And if Penrose and Hameroff are correct and quantum energy is the ticket to consciousness, it\u2019s also notable that we have more evidence of quantum activity in plants than in human brains. Specifically, plants \u201ceat\u201d photons, which are quantum packets of light energy, and many scientists believe this is a quantum process.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n yogaesoteric <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Research suggests that consciousness could extend far beyond just humans \u2013 every cellular creature in the universe, no matter how big or small, could be conscious, too. Studies show that single-cell organisms \u2013 like mould \u2013 display traits associated with cognition, such as counting and collaborating. Plants are included in this theory as well; researchers […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1372],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-231540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-studies-4260-en"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/yogaesoteric.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231540","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/yogaesoteric.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/yogaesoteric.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yogaesoteric.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yogaesoteric.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=231540"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/yogaesoteric.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231540\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":231547,"href":"https:\/\/yogaesoteric.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231540\/revisions\/231547"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/yogaesoteric.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=231540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yogaesoteric.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=231540"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/yogaesoteric.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=231540"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/yogaesoteric.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/2-8-300x200.jpg\")
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\nApril 19, 2026<\/strong><\/p>\n