Human influence comes of age

摘要

Humanity's profound impact on this planet is hard to deny, but is it big enough to merit its own geological epoch? This is the question facing geoscien-tists gathered in London this week to debate the validity and definition of the 'Anthropo-cene', a proposed new epoch characterized by human effects on the geological record. "We are in the process of formalizing it," says Michael Ellis, head of the climate-change programme of the British Geological Survey in Nottingham, who coordinated the 11 May meeting. He and others hope that adopting the term will shift the thinking of policy-makers. "It should remind them of the global and significant impact that humans have," says Ellis.