What Is The Anthropocene?

The post-apocalyptic subject in the film industry is an area that often thrives at the box office. People thoroughly enjoy watching movies that exhibit Earth’s tarnished environment and humans’ last means of survival. At one point of time or another, the scenes in these once fictional movies may come true with the way humans are abusing the planet. Elizabeth Kolbert’s novel, The Sixth Extinction, discusses the five major causes of mass extinction. She alludes human existence as the cause of the next mass extinction. The author cites established chemist, Paul Crutzen, claiming “we are no longer in the Holocene; we are in the Anthropocene” (Kolbert 108). The Anthropocene is human dominated epoch that is disrupting other species’ existence. Of

In “The Changing Nature of Nature: Environmental Politics in the Anthropocene” environmental politician Paul Wapner depicts the human impacts on nature, and their significant intervention in ecosystem dynamics. His research outlines the “end of nature” (Wapner, 37) and aims to put emphasis on the beginning of the Anthropocene, suggesting that we are finally realizing that nature is not merely a material object. With this in mind, Wapner argues that the ways in which we protect nature should be significantly different, this, justifying his study. In order to form an argument, Wapner begins by summarizing a general piece of academic research, and through this is then able to provide an organized overview of the logic of his argument. The alternation

Is climate change caused by mankind or is it simply a natural occurrence? If the answer were as easy as “yes, it is 100% caused by humans,” or “no it’s not at all caused by humans,” there would be very little room for argument. Two questions need to be investigated: 1) Is it probable that such a young species could really be responsible for causing enough air pollution in approximately 250 years, from the 1700’s to mid 1900’s, to alter the climate of the entire planet? 2) Is it probable that mankind’s industrialization from the

Humanity is confronted by multiple environmental challenges which threaten to undermine the advances in health achieved over recent decades. The Rockefeller Foundation/Lancet Commission on Planetary Health showed how climate change, loss of biodiversity, land use change, ocean acidification and overfishing, nitrogen and phosphorus loading and environmental pollution more generally all have the potential to adversely affect health through a range of pathways1. A recent joint publication by WHO and Convention on Biological Diversity articulated the myriad connections between biodiversity and health and the threats to both posed by environmental change2. The dramatic changes in the global environment have led many scientists to conclude that we are living in a new geological epoch – the Anthropocene – in which the activities of one species – homo sapiens -have become the dominant driving force transforming the Earth’s natural systems3. These natural systems provide food, clean water and air and modulate the global temperature within limits in which humanity has been able to flourish for around 11,500 years during the preceding Holocene epoch.

Anthropocene is a term used to describe earth’s history including when humans dominated a majority of natural processes globally. Anthropocence was a term used throughout the article to discuss the impact humankind had on the environment that caused many changes that had a negative impact over many years. Another term used was anthrones, the human footprint, which describes how much human kind has made lasting impassions on the earth. These terms have made me come to the realization anthropology operates at the crossroads of social and physical sciences, along with humanities to examine the diversity of humankind across many cultures and time.

In my opinion the modern revolution has been the greatest period in the anthropocene era due to the many advances that were made in areas such as transportation, technology, medicine, communication, and food production. In reality all of these innovations were fueled by fossil fuels. They fuels, or energy sources, which were fossil fuels include coal, oil, and natural gas. The burning of these fossil fuels were able to be used to power steam engines and eventually internal combustion engines. These were the real drivers of the modern revolution With the discovery of fossil fuels we were able to power steam engines and internal combustion engines that could drive machines that were able to do much more work then any human being ever could.

The chapter then moves to Kolbert’s experience with ammonite fossils in Princeton, New Jersey. While the distinct spiral shape of ammonites is well-known and agreed upon, the exact shape and structure of the mollusk in the shell is heavily debated. Ammonites are then compared to nautiluses, living animals that heavily resemble ammonites, in terms of why one species was able to flourish, while the other was wiped out. Chapter five lays out the concept that ordinarily species go extinct at a gradual, slow pacing, unless of course there is a catastrophic event, such as human meddling or a giant asteroid, in which case the extinction process is expedited. The extinct species that Kolbert studies in this chapter is the graptolite, a long, thin, V-shaped marine animal. The extinction of grapolite is theorized to be due to a drastic change in the ocean. Kolbert additionally tells a theory that, in the future, rats will be the predominant race on Earth, overtaking even humans. This is all based on the fact that humans have too drastically changed the Earth’s composition and wherever humans go and change, rats are there to follow. Thus we are ushering in the Anthropocene, or the “age of humans,” a time period in which humans have wrecked up the planet to the point of no

Coexisting with each of its counterparts, Mother Earth and the system in which we live in effortlessly orchestrates the fundamental basis of not only human existence but nevertheless all of the life in which it contains. The climate of our Earth however, has been continuously changing since the beginning of its formation about 4.5 billion years ago although; it wasn’t until around the early 18th century that a widespread concern occurred in American minds regarding the treatment of our environment. This altered perspective made way for understanding that humans have made the biggest impact to our planet, biosphere, and atmosphere etc. drastically more so than any other organism. It is commonly argued in Jared Diamond’s The Worst Mistake in

To begin with, Scranton describes the scenery of war in Iraq and if he would have survived and persevered this journey. Humans would have to embrace the modern advancements today’s society to outlast the Anthropocene. As a matter of fact, struggles, consequences, obstacles and death are various aspects of life that we should embrace and not ignore. The understanding of civilization is very important and acquiring the knowledge to be aware of major concerns and issues of the environment is substantial. Scranton emphasizes that humans have not progressed to avoid the “unmanageable global warning”, but humankind could live and adjust to the changes of the environment (Scranton 24). The is future is always a concern but uncertain, whereas we cannot disregard our destinies.

The Anthropocene additionally enables us to rethink the connection amongst people and whatever is left of the normal world. Regardless of when it started, the idea of the Anthropocene is noteworthy. It features the size of our effect on Earth. By characterizing another epoch, we are announcing that the effect of our activities is worldwide and irreversible. It enables us to join various talks in regards to the condition of the planet, from environmental change to loss of biodiversity to natural degradation, by distinguishing the one thing they have in like manner; they have all been influenced by human impact.

Majority of the current, official geological time units have been dated and confirmed after the fact. Presently, humans are living in the Anthropocene and “the stratigraphic record is the past” (Finney and Edwards, 8). Finney and Edwards see this discrepancy as an issue because claiming the Anthropocene as part of the records appears as an attempt “to interpret past event’s in Earth’s history” without even having all the evidence (Finney and Edwards, 8). Moreover, the stratigraphic records and its units are studied using “stratigraphic techniques, concepts, and principles,” while the Anthropocene has been largely based on human observations (Finney and Edwards, 8). On the other hand, the Anthropocene has been analyzed using some of the stratigraphic techniques as well as how geological events have been measured through human observation and documentation. The Anthropocene is not portrayed as a geological event, but as a good candidate for a geological time unit. However, Finney and Edwards see the Anthropocene’s candidacy as a misunderstanding in what composes a geological time

Has Earth entered into a new geologic epoch, characterized by human influences? A recent study, spear-headed by the British Geological Survey, has come to the conclusion that man’s global impact has become distinct enough to end the Holocene and effectively begin the Anthropocene. Published in Science, the study identifies how man’s impact on our oceans, resources, climate, and vegetation has altered the sedimentary makeup of the planet. Massive species invasions, increased rates of extinction, genetically modified plants, redistributed metals, sediment, hydrocarbons, fossils, increased levels of carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus all combine to create signals that geologists interpret to denote a break in the Holocene

Though, stratigraphic conventions presently place the modern world in the Holocene epoch, it is unlikely this classification persists for much longer. As human environmental impacts continue to grow exponentially, it has become increasingly obvious that mankind is no longer a captive participant in the global ecosystem. Instead, throwing off the shackles of environmental determinism, humans have fundamentally altered their relationship with nature, becoming agents of environmental change unlike any the world has witnessed before. This new era, defined by our environmental actions, christened the “Anthropocene,” has become progressively more popular since its inception in the late 1800s. Yet, despite its pervasiveness in today’s scientific literature,

This book is about how life and death is waiting for us all at the end and why we should be concern with geology, so we can understand how our ethic is deciding the many processes that is being carried out. Also, it’s about an attempt to respond to this Anthropocene.

Since before the industrial evolutions humans have been pumping green house gasses—carbon dioxide, water vapor, methane, nitrous oxide, and chlorofluorocarbons— into the atmosphere however, it wasn’t until recently that the amounts being produced are shoving the Earth into a sixth extinction. While the causes of this upcoming extinction are constantly debated on it has earned itself the name Holocene extinction. This name is derived from the theory that humans are the main contributors to this extinction. To investigate the cause Elizabeth Kolbert, and American journalist and professor at Williams College, took the world on a wild and saddening journey on the human contribution to this looming extinction in her novel, The Sixth Extinction; An Unnatural History. Not only does Kolbert’s book explain how humans have contributed to global warming and its effects on life on land but also ocean acidification and how life under the sea has changed over the years.