A top panel of geologists has decided not to grant the ‘human age’ its own distinct place in Earth’s geological timeline after disagreeing over when exactly our era might have begun.
A top panel of geologists has decided not to grant the ‘human age’ its own distinct place in Earth’s geological timeline after disagreeing over when exactly our era might have begun.
After 15 years of deliberation, a team of scientists made the case that humankind has so fundamentally altered the natural world that a new phase of Earth’s existence—a new epoch—has already begun.
Soaring greenhouse gases, the spread of microplastics, decimation of other species, and fallout from nuclear tests—all were submitted as evidence that the world entered the Anthropocene, or era of humans, in the mid-20th century.
But the proposal was rejected in a contentious vote that has been upheld by the International Union of Geological Sciences, the field’s governing body said in a statement published on its website on Thursday.
The decision “to reject the proposal for an Anthropocene Epoch as a formal unit of the Geologic Time Scale is approved”, it said.
