{"id":312,"date":"2015-09-22T15:12:11","date_gmt":"2015-09-22T19:12:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/web.colby.edu\/humanslashnature\/?p=312"},"modified":"2015-09-22T15:12:11","modified_gmt":"2015-09-22T19:12:11","slug":"the-anthropocene-does-it-really-exist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/humanslashnature\/2015\/09\/22\/the-anthropocene-does-it-really-exist\/","title":{"rendered":"The Anthropocene–Does It Really Exist?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The the beginning of the Anthropocene\u2014 a new, human-dominated age\u2014was a new concept that was introduced to me during Tuesday\u2019s lecture. It appeared odd to me that there we may consider a new age of humans, and only of humans. The argument was that a \u2018new age of human dominance\u2019 has arrived because human activity is altering the planet on a scale that is comparable with some major events in the past. However looking over a span of millions of years, have we really had that big of an impact on the planet, enough to create a new epoch\u00a0of \u2018human dominance?\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n

As I was doing some research on the debate over the Anthropocene, it was interesting to notice that there are\u00a0split opinions between environmentalists and geologists. Environmentalists popularized the idea of the Anthropocene, however geologists seem to criticize this idea. Geologists argue that in order for you to define an age boundary, you need to find evidence in the rock strata, and the evidence of an Anthropocene simply cannot be found in the rocks.<\/span><\/p>\n

I am not trying to argue that the changes that humans have brought to the planet is something we should ignore. However, I wanted to allude to the fact that \u2018the Anthropocene\u2019 still appears to be an idea that is hotly debated among groups of people.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Relevant Articles:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAnthropocene: The human age\u201d Nature (2015) http:\/\/www.nature.com\/news\/anthropocene-the-human-age-1.17085<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWhat is the Anthropocene and Are We in It?\u201d (2013) http:\/\/www.smithsonianmag.com\/science-nature\/what-is-the-anthropocene-and-are-we-in-it-164801414\/?no-ist<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cClimate change: Learning to think like a geologist\u201d (2008) http:\/\/www.paulmacrae.com\/?p=62<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The the beginning of the Anthropocene\u2014 a new, human-dominated age\u2014was a new concept that was introduced to me during Tuesday\u2019s lecture. It appeared odd to me that there we may consider a new age of humans, and only of humans…. Continue Reading →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5925,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[156948],"tags":[256098,256550,256265],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/humanslashnature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/humanslashnature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/humanslashnature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/humanslashnature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5925"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/humanslashnature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=312"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/humanslashnature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":313,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/humanslashnature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312\/revisions\/313"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/humanslashnature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=312"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/humanslashnature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=312"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.colby.edu\/humanslashnature\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=312"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}