DID *WE* DO THAT...?
Many scientists suggest that we no longer live in the Holocene epoch of geology, but in a newly-proposed epoch called the Anthropocene (the age of Man). The term was coined by Nobel Prize-winning Dutch chemist Paul Crutzen in 2002.
Scientists are still considering the official acceptance of the Anthropocene as an epoch, as it is yet unclear if the Anthropocene satisfies the criteria used for naming a new epoch.
Crutzen and some others made the case for formally recognizing the Anthropocene as a new epoch in Earth history beginning with the Industrial Revolution around 1800. Their reasons involved “the profound changes to our relationship with the rest of the living world” (Steffen 842) including humanity’s affect upon the ozone layer, the large emission of carbon dioxide, our alteration of several other element cycles, our modification of the terrestrial water cycle, and the likelihood that we are driving the sixth major extinction in Earth history (Steffen 843).
(Steffen, Will; Jacques Grinevald, Paul Crutzen and John McNeill. “The Anthropocene: conceptual and historical perspectives.” Philosophical Transactions: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, Vol. 369, No. 1938, The Anthropocene: a new epoch of geological time? (13 March 2011), pp. 842-867. Published by the Royal Society)
