A proposal to codify a new geological epoch based on humanity's influence on Earth is rebuffed
Like many materials, concrete saw a dramatic rise in production and use after World War Two.A proposal to codify a new geological epoch based on humanity's influence on Earth has been rejected.
It means "The Anthropocene" will not be added to the chronostratigraphic chart featured in textbooks and on classroom posters to record the major changes in Earth history.
The International Union of Geological Sciences upheld an earlier vote by a lower committee to dismiss the idea.
"Despite its rejection as a formal unit of the geologic timescale, the Anthropocene will nevertheless continue to be used not only by Earth and environmental scientists but also by social scientists, politicians and economists as well as by the public at large," the IUGS said.
"It will remain an invaluable descriptor of human impact on the Earth system."
The term "Anthropocene" comes from the Greek for human, "Anthropo".
The Anthropocene Working Group of scientists had spent over a decade studying the concept and definition of a new unit of geological time, using this term.
While there is broad agreement humanity's impacts on Earth are pervasive and sufficiently distinctive to justify a separate geological classification, there is considerable debate over when our species became a force of global change.
There is a strong body of opinion that any Anthropocene classification should reflect the major impacts humans introduced as they cut down forests and turned land over to agriculture, which would put the start date many thousands of years in the past.
Another attempt to introduce a new unit of geological time will now have to wait a decade.