Hacker News

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> Knowing this, I'd be more than surprised if Trees - or plants in general - haven't had any methods to control their food source: the atmosphere. I believe they do.

Recently there was an article posted here that claimed trees do have some ability to control the weather. The claim is trees simultaneously release water vapor into the atmosphere influencing rains.

We recognize corporations as legal entities with rights because it makes a great deal of the legal wrangling around, eg, assigning blame for criminal activity, or assigning permissions to operate, more convenient. Assigning rights to trees means not having to draw the entire causal chain to the harms done to people by environmental degradation, which can take years to manifest and is often irreversible. It’s the same legal fiction for the same reason.

Yeah, the article reads like they suddenly realized that trees are alive and rushed to make their discovery a law. Look how ridiculous this sounds:

> Desrochers' film, called Des arbes et des arts convinced citizens that trees are living entities that breathe and communicate with each other through their root systems.

Did the citizens... not know that trees are alive? Have they never seen a tree? What do you mean a film convinced them that trees are living entities??? Did schools not convince them of this? Seems like a massive failure of the education system.

> "A tree is like a human being," Bourdeau said. "It breathes, it lives, it takes in water..."

Yes! They're ALIVE and thus are "like a human being". A tree is like a human being, a cockroach is like a human being, a horse is like a human being. Everything that's alive is "like a human being"!

> ...the tree declaration is special because it acknowledges that a single tree is an ecosystem of its own, which can provide shade, food and habitat for other species.

Special compared to what? It seems like the lawmakers went outside for the first time, saw trees and were genuinely fascinated with them. Yes, even a single tree can be an ecosystem of its own. Is this not common knowledge? How is this special?

> ...[trees] have dignity and they have senses," she said. "Not sentiments, but senses ... They can feel and they communicate with each other in a very specific way."

I'm not an expert in trees, but it would make a lot of sense if trees could communicate with each other. Complex root systems, various pheromones, sure, communication could totally be possible. Dignity, though? Of course, a robust, tall tree definitely looks like a worthy person. But they seem to mean this literally, which sounds like nonsense.

> "What do trees do if not standing?" she said. "If anything has standing, it's a tree."

This sounds profound, but I'm not sure what it means.

We kinda draw arbitrary lines? I mean we do animal rights and animal welfare, so what really is the difference between a mouse and a tarantula in those terms

are cockroaches threatened by industry in the same way trees are?

I studied an ancient form of communing with trees, through treediets (https://sacredtreekeepers.com) where I had a ~10 day fast with tree bark tea. there's certainly sentience and life form in them, unlike ours and also able to be connected to, if we have the right modulation of our awareness and sensory experience.

it doesn't just take a psychedelic experience to see this though.

Just because you haven't experienced something, and overely on your intellectual and thinking faculties (because you can't rationalize or understand something with you mind you discount its rights or existence) doesn't mean its true. Edit: I mean we in general overrely on our minds as filters for knowledge, wisdom and understanding when in reality much of knowledge, wisdom and understanding cannot be grasped by the mind or thinking; in many cases the mind deceives & tricks us.

> Note that I'm all for the protection of trees - for pretty obvious environmental, esthetic, and human usage reasons. I just don't think recognizing trees as having their own rights as living beings makes any sense whatsoever.

Sadly, I don't think making sense matters for this kind of people.

It already says in the article they won’t be building anymore housing because they are forbidding cutting down trees to clear land to build, and they’re already out of open lots to build on.

This is 100% NIMBYs finding new ways to protect their property values.

This is like saying guns will be weaponized. The entire point of this is to be a NIMBY weapon.

.. coming soon to San Francisco I bet

The goal is definitely not to protect trees.

Does a tree have a direct blood connection to a person? Does a tree die if that connection is severed?

Living in Queens NYC I can see the large disparity between the greenery prevalent in the tax photos present on 1940s.nyc. After my grandparents passed we sold the house that had three nice shade trees, patio, a garden, grass along the side and a front lawn. Only the front lawn remains. The rest was entombed in concrete. Houses around the area suffer the same fate - yards completely devoid of green life and instead concrete. When it rains water pours down driveways into the gutter leaving the combined sewer system to deal with water that should be in the earth.

We make cities look like concrete blocks in order to have dense housing and protect the little forest land we have left.

Most cities already have strict rules for removing existing trees. Usually anything over 6 inch diameter at shoulder level is off limits without getting specific approval.

If we start letting trees communicate by underground signalling though a network of mycorrhizal fungus, it’s going to be the death of French. It’s important that every living being learns to adopt the culture.

On every penny they make.

The property taxes are largely offset by the carbon credits, though.

For something to be recognized as a living being with rights does it need to pay taxes?

No, they are tax cheats. It has been notoriously hard to arrest them and send them to jail however.

This definitely qualifies as a weird legal hack.

Quebec's legal system is not based on common-law like the rest of the provinces.