The document discusses the concept of the Anthropocene geological epoch, defined as the current period in which human activity has been the dominant influence on climate and the environment. It provides background on when the term originated in the 1980s and its increasing usage and debate within the scientific community. The document argues that the designation of an Anthropocene epoch could mark a profound cultural shift in how humanity perceives its relationship with the planet.
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Anthropocene and culture dec 2013 web
1. Image: Jason de Caires Taylor
Culture
and the Anthropocene
OWEN GAFFNEY
Director of communications, International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme
Botswana, November 2013
2. Image: Jason de Caires Taylor
What is the Anthropocene?
Why is it important?
3. Oxford dictionary definition
relating to or denoting the current geological
age, viewed as the period during which human
activity has been been the dominant influence
on climate and the environment.
Image: Felix Pharand Deschenes
4. Ice Age ends
Population (billion)
7
6
5
4
Holocene
3
2
1
200,000
70,000 40,000
50,000
12,000 9000 6000
11,000
200
Time (years before present)
5. Population
US Bureau of the Census (2000) International database
IGBP synthesis: Global Change and the Earth System, Steffen et al 2004
6. Total real GDP
Nordhaus (1997) The economics of new goods. University of Chicago Press
IGBP synthesis: Global Change and the Earth System, Steffen et al 2004
7. Foreign direct investment
World Bank (2002) data and statistics
IGBP synthesis: Global Change and the Earth System, Steffen et al 2004
8. Damming of rivers
World Commission on Dams (2000)
IGBP synthesis: Global Change and the Earth System, Steffen et al 2004
9. Water use
Shiklomanov (1990) Global Water Resources
IGBP synthesis: Global Change and the Earth System, Steffen et al 2004
14. Telephones
Canning (2001) A database of world infrastructure stocks, 1950-95 World Bank
IGBP synthesis: Global Change and the Earth System, Steffen et al 2004
15. International tourism
World Tourism Organization (2001) Tourism industry trends
IGBP synthesis: Global Change and the Earth System, Steffen et al 2004
16. Fisheries exploitation
Percentage of global fisheries either fully exploited, overfished or collapsed. Source:
FAOSTAT (2002) Statistical databases
IGBP synthesis: Global Change and the Earth System, Steffen et al 2004
17. Shrimp farm production
IAnnual shrimp production as a proxy for coastal zone alteration. Sources: WRI (2003)
A guide to world resources, 2002-2004
IGBP synthesis: Global Change and the Earth System, Steffen et al 2004
18. Domesticated land
Amount of land converted to pasture and cropland. Source: Klein Goldewijk and Battjes (1997)
National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM). Bilthoven, Netherlands
IGBP synthesis: Global Change and the Earth System, Steffen et al 2004
22. Northern hemisphere average surface
temperature
Mann et al Geophys Res Lett 26(6): 759-762
IGBP synthesis: Global Change and the Earth System, Steffen et al 2004
23. Ozone depletion
percentage total column ozone loss over Antarctica, using the average annual total
column ozone, 330, as a base. Image: J.D. Shanklin, British Antarctic Survey
IGBP synthesis: Global Change and the Earth System, Steffen et al 2004
24. Tropical rainforest and woodland loss
Loss of tropical rainforest and woodland, as estimated for tropical Africa, Latin America and South and
Southeast Asia. Sources: Richards (1990) In: The Earth as transformed by human action, Cambridge
University Press IGBP synthesis: Global Change and the Earth System, Steffen et al 2004
25. Natural climatic disasters
Decadal frequency of great floods (one-in-100-year events) after 1860 for basins larger than 200 000 km2 with
observations that span at least 30 years. Source: Milly et al. (2002) Nature 415:514-517 IGBP synthesis:
Global Change and the Earth System, Steffen et al 2004
26. Coastal zone nitrogen flux
Model-calculated partitioning of the human-induced nitrogen perturbation fluxes in the global coastal
margin for the period since 1850. Source: Mackenzie et al. (2002) Chem. Geology 190:13-32
IGBP synthesis: Global Change and the Earth System, Steffen et al 2004
27. Biodiversity loss
Mathematically calculated rate of extinction. Source: Wilson (1992) The diversity of life, the Penguin Press.
IGBP synthesis: Global Change and the Earth System, Steffen et al 2004
37. 1992: New York Times journalist Andrew Revkin
“We are entering an age that might
someday be referred to as, say, the
Anthrocene [sic]. After all, it is a
geological age of our own making.”
Global Warming: Understanding the
forecast
38. 1989: U.S writer and activist Bill McKibben
publishes the End of Nature
39. 1980s: U.S. biologist Eugene Stoermer’s (1934-2012)
lectures mention the Anthropocene
41. Vladimir Verdansky (1863-1945)
GeosphereBiosphere Noösphere
Life is a geological force
Just as the emergence of life
fundamentally transformed the
geosphere, the emergence of
human cognition fundamentally
transforms the biosphere.
Image: Memorial Office Museum of
Academician VI Verdansky
Moscow.
Vernadsky and Teilhard de Chardin
used the term “noösphere” – the world
of thought – to mark the growing role
of human brain-power in shaping its
own future and environment.
42. George Perkins Marsh (1801-1882)
Man and Nature (1864)
The Earth as Modified by
Human Action: Man and
Nature. (1874)
George P. Marsh, photographed by Mathew B. Brady between
1855 and 1865. Brady-Handy Collection (Library of Congress).
[call number: BH8201-4981; reproduction number: LC-BH82014981 DLC (b&w film copy neg.)
43. Antonio Stoppani (1824-1891)
Corso di geologia
(1873)
„Anthropozoic era‟
…Defined by a “new telluric
force, which in power and
universality may be compared
to the greater forces of earth.”
Image: Paleontologica Lombarda
48. “The concept of the
ANTHROPOCENE
heralds a profound
shift in PERCEPTION
of our place in the
WORLD.”
Nobel Laureate Elinor Ostrom
(1933-2012)
Planet Under Pressure
Photo credit: Chris Meyer
58. Thank you!
OWEN GAFFNEY
Director of communications
International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme
Botswana November 2013
Owen.gaffney@igbp.kva.se
Twitter:
@owengaffney
@igbpcomms
www.igbp.net
Notas do Editor
This great acceleration really started in the 50s
The biophysical responses of the Earth System show many of the same features as the Great Acceleration in the human enterprise.The hockeystick pattern applies all key indicators that form the basis for human well being and environmental health.
A single human lifetime
AdamNieman
Earth rise. 1968 Nasa astronaut William Anders. Apollo missions and Russian spaceflights provide humanity with new perspective. Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring warns of environmental damage. Club of Rome and Limits to Growth create a new narrative for humanity1972 Stockholm Summit puts global environment and human action on the political landscape.
Decision may be made in 2016.Stratigraphy commission websitehttp://www.quaternary.stratigraphy.org.uk/workinggroups/anthropocene/The 'Anthropocene' is not a formally defined geological unit within the Geological Time Scale. A proposal to formalise the 'Anthropocene' is being developed by the 'Anthropocene' Working Group for consideration by the International Commission on Stratigraphy, with a current target date of 2016. Care should be taken to distinguish the concept of an 'Anthropocene' from the previously used term Anthropogene (cf. below**).The 'Anthropocene' is currently being considered by the Working Group as a potential geological epoch, i.e. at the same hierarchical level as the Pleistocene and Holocene epochs, with the implication that it is within the Quaternary Period, but that the Holocene has terminated. It might, alternatively, also be considered at a lower (Age) hierarchical level; that would imply it is a subdivision of the ongoing Holocene Epoch.Broadly, to be accepted as a formal term the 'Anthropocene' needs to be (a) scientifically justified (i.e. the 'geological signal' currently being produced in strata now forming must be sufficiently large, clear and distinctive) and (b) useful as a formal term to the scientific community. In terms of (b), the currently informal term 'Anthropocene' has already proven to be very useful to the global change research community and thus will continue to be used, but it remains to be determined whether formalisation within the Geological Time Scale would make it more useful or broaden its usefulness to other scientific communities, such as the geological community.The beginning of the 'Anthropocene' is most generally considered to be at c. 1800 CE, around the beginning of the Industrial Revolution in Europe (Crutzen's original suggestion); other potential candidates for time boundaries have been suggested, at both earlier dates (within or even before the Holocene) or later (e.g. at the start of the nuclear age). A formal 'Anthropocene' might be defined either with reference to a particular point within a stratal section, that is, a Global Stratigraphic Section and Point (GSSP), colloquially known as a 'golden spike; or, by a designated time boundary (a Global Standard Stratigraphic Age).The 'Anthropocene' has emerged as a popular scientific term used by scientists, the scientifically engaged public and the media to designate the period of Earth's history during which humans have a decisive influence on the state, dynamics and future of the Earth system. It is widely agreed that the Earth is currently in this state.
3 new journals launched with Anthropocene in the title in the last 12 months
New challenge for international politics to include/manage earth system processes. A new responsibility forcing us to question whether we have the right institutions to do this.
Our international organizations were not set up to deal with the challenges we have today. We have a new responsibility at a global scale. The biggest challenge we face is to find a way to manage the global commons. Towards the end of her career ElinorOstrom increasingly discussed the challenge. She died after a short battle with cancer earlier this year, just a week before the Rio+20 summit, the largest gathering in UN history – 188 heads of state and ministers, 50,000 people. If we are to manage the global commons our world view needs to change. Our world view extends from our self to our family, community, city and nation. Increasingly it extends to the global.
Have we affected the Earth’s biogeochemical cycles to such an extent we can now say we have entered a new geological epoch? Paul Crutzen (Nobel laureate and former vice chair of the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme) argued in Nature in 2002 that we have entered the Anthropocene.In June 2011 the Economist ran it as the cover story following a groundbreaking conference at the London Geological Society in May 2011. This marked the beginning of Anthropocene fever. The media loved the concept.
There are many scientific paradigm shifts that are only of interest to a small scientific community. Occasionally a paradigm shift occurs in science that has major repercussions In society. They cause us to reevaluate ourselves and our place in the world. In the past their impact has even been seen as heretical. Copernicus and Darwin were major scientific and cultural milestones for us as a species and society. Will the Anthropocene create such a cultural paradigm shift, or is it just a buzz word that will die out like post-modernism or post industrialism
Thank Jerry and MichaelExcite WMO about the potential of data viz, show lots of examplesExplore the value of data viz for Earth system scienceTalk about some examples of good practice and exemplary examples (and show that it is not a panacea)Discuss the role of data viz and policyTalk about WMO and data viz opportunitiesMy backgroundNo equations. No computational fluid dynamics