Source: AGU Advances
Humans have remodeled the Earth so profoundly that in 2000, atmospheric chemist Paul Crutzen and biologist Eugene Stoermer proposed that the Holocene epoch had ended and the “Anthropocene,” or human epoch, had begun. But despite the extent of human-induced changes, last year the International Union of Geological Sciences (IUGS) decided against giving the Anthropocene official recognition as the current geologic epoch. Now, several scientists involved in the process have published a commentary explaining why they think the Anthropocene deserves another chance at epoch status.
McCarthy et al. argue against two related criticisms of the proposal: First, the proposed Anthropocene began only 72 years ago, whereas epochs typically span millions of years, and second, the future is not a part of geologic time, so it would be inappropriate to designate an epoch based on the expectation that humans will be making their mark on Earth far into the future.
The length of the Anthropocene is beside the point, the authors argue, because functionally, Earth has already entered an unprecedented time. Energy consumption since the mid-20th century is sixfold what it was in the 11,700 years that came before. As a result, global temperatures are rising sharply, with wide-ranging implications for everything from ocean levels to biodiversity to ice sheets. These changes will be long-lived, and some are irreversible. In fact, the onset and magnitude of such dramatic alterations over such a short timescale underscore the point that Earth has entered a new epoch, the authors say.
Some stratigraphers have argued that designating a human-centric epoch politicizes geology, but the authors argue that ignoring data to preserve the status quo is just as political. Likewise, the authors take umbrage with reports that the matter cannot be revisited for a decade and thus the question of whether we live in the Anthropocene is settled until then. “It is not,” they wrote. (AGU Advances, https://doi.org/10.1029/2024AV001430, 2025)
—Saima May Sidik (@saimamay.bsky.social), Science Writer
Citation: Sidik, S. M. (2025), Anthropocene deserves official recognition, some experts maintain, Eos, 106,https://doi.org/10.1029/2025EO250117. Published on 25 March 2025.
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