Currently, we’re in the midst of the Holocene epoch, which began in 9,700 BCE and is defined by a stable, warm period following the last ice age during the Pleistocene.
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Prof Jan Zalasiewicz of the University of Leicester said: “Human action has certainly left traces on the Earth for thousands of years”. ICS past chair Stanley Finney, who also made a presentation at the IGC, argues that the stratigraphic record for the Anthropocene is minimal and that the proposed beginning of the Anthropocene in the mid-20th century would not include a significant amount of human-influenced changes that took place before then.
“It is affecting the functioning of the whole earth system”.
IT’S official! Or as official as anything can be after an worldwide congress in South Africa has worked on it for seven years.
According to the Geological Congress of South Africa, the human race has reached the Anthropocene Age. The goal now, BBC News said, is to find the “golden spike (s)” that scientists can use to signal the dawning of the new age. So the working group is going to be busy in the coming years, but they’re confident this is going to happen.
Once members of the AWG reach a consensus on their “golden spike (s)”, they will the set to work on a final assessment, and once completed, that report will be reviewed by members of the worldwide geological community, noted BBC News. “It also expressed the extent to which humanity is driving rapid and widespread changes to the Earth system that will variously persist and potentially intensify into the future”. The group released their preliminary recommendations on Monday, and they say that the Anthropocene time segment should be recognized.
The researchers suggested we have entered human-influenced age known as the Anthropocene Epoch, which would be the first new geological epoch in more than 11,700 years.
Scientists refer to the period starting from 1950 as the “Great Acceleration”, and a glance at graphs tracking a number of chemical and socio-economic changes make it obvious why.
After seven years of deliberation, the 35-person Working Group voted 30-to-three (two members abstained) to register the change.
The recommendation by the WGA backs up research from University College London previous year which argued that humans had been living in the Anthropocene era since 1610.
Various papers have identified telltale markers of human intervention, including fly ash from the Industrial Revolution, pesticides in the soil, changing levels of carbon dioxide in ice cores and increasing rates of species extinction; but the sign that will likely hold up best is radioactive material. Plastic pollution, soot from power plants, concrete and even domestic chicken bones were considered possible contenders.
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So it’s not official yet, but Zalasiewicz believes the team have a “pretty good case” to present.
