A review by bristlecone
The Nation of Plants by Stefano Mancuso

2.0

This was fine. I get what the author was trying to do. But I'm increasingly annoyed with authors who chastise others for attempting real solutions while offering no concrete solutions themselves. Yes, we could learn a lot from plants. But virtually no attention is given to how plant systems/behaviors -- systems devised by and for beings that live in a single place, never moving, and with relatively stable and often lifelong communities --- can actually be adopted and implemented by mobile beings that move within and across places with shifting constellations of relationships.

Also, it's darkly funny when an author explains how the Dunning-Krueger effect works in one section, and then actively demonstrates the Dunning-Krueger effect in the next section when confidently discussing their very limited knowledge and major simplifications to draw sweeping conclusions about institutions.