When did the Anthropocene begin? Scientists make the case for a specific year

When did the Anthropocene begin? Scientists make the case for a specific year

People were reshaping soils 2,000 years ago, and lead pollution appears in the geological record stretching back 3,500 years. But when did human activity begin transforming Earth on a global scale?

A group of 37 researchers argues that early human impacts and the planet’s recent transformation are different stories.

Using one name for both, they write, obscures how sharply conditions changed in the mid-20th century.

They propose reserving “Anthropocene” for a geological epoch beginning in 1952, while giving the longer history of human influence a separate name.

The argument appears as a perspective piece, built on published evidence rather than a new dataset. Its lead author is Jan Zalasiewicz of the University of Leicester, who co-chairs the Anthropocene Working Group.

Co-authors include Buhm Soon Park of KAIST in South Korea, Julia Adeney Thomas of the University of Notre Dame, and Jürgen Renn of Germany’s Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology.

“The Anthropocene is a common language for understanding how rapidly and extensively humans are changing the Earth,” Park said.

“By clarifying its meaning and ...