Thanks for the insightful comments. I do think it is important for Earthlings to contemplate the idea that the Earth has been so affected by humans, that the emerging Epoch has taken a name that recognizes their impact (i.e. the Anthropocene Epoch).
Ahh, the population question — you are demonstrating your prescience. My next post will discuss the effects that the exploding population has on climate change, and it will also look at the other side of population control, namely, population collapse. Take for example the Japanese, they are now approaching two workers for each retired person! That doesn't sound good. Be sure to read the next post.
It is hard to comprehend timelines of the magnitude of Geologic time scales, eons, and even epochs. Here is a slightly humorous yet scary visualization of a mere 21000 years, from xkcd, which has stuck in my mind since they first published it - https://xkcd.com/1732/
And I do agree that something must be done about the population. Though I have doubts whether we be successful before something catastrophic reduces our population for us, as your Volcanoes, etc post points out are possibilities that have happened, and will happen again.
Thanks for the comment. The graph/chart is very informative. Our lives are quite short when viewed in geologic time frames. The Anthropocene Epoch won't end in a couple of generations. The changes we have put in place will linger for a very long time — CO2, once introduced into the atmosphere will stay there for 300 to 1,000 years. It's hard to predict what the future will look like, but it will be warmer, it will be more crowed, and probably a lot less pleasant than the lives we have been privileged to live.
Hello Robert, and thanks for this post. I've heard the term Anthropocene Epoch before, but did not realize it's so widely recognized! Maybe that's a good thing in some way; maybe it will help us all be aware of our very large "footprint" on the Earth. Call me Pollyanna but I've always believed that a full awareness of a situation, even if the news is very bad, is absolutely necessary in taking steps to solve it.
The question of population, and the Earth's carrying capacity, is a welcome one to me anyway. It's quite a hot-button issue though everywhere. To me it's obvious that we need to limit our numbers but it quickly turns into accusations of elitism and even genocide. That's a tough one! There are all of those demographic facts about how populations tend to taper off once living standards rise, but I personally feel we've run out of time for that to happen; we need to be more pro-active.
Thanks for your comment. Population explosion is one of the problems that will make controlling climate change quite difficult. Even if we halted population growth today, we are faced with the fact that 2 to 3 billion existing people want a better life — and that means we need more energy production to provide the stuff that the underprivileged want.
Alternatively, those that have a lot of stuff, might be required to have less stuff. (Now there is a controversial solution.)
Kathlene,
Thanks for the insightful comments. I do think it is important for Earthlings to contemplate the idea that the Earth has been so affected by humans, that the emerging Epoch has taken a name that recognizes their impact (i.e. the Anthropocene Epoch).
Ahh, the population question — you are demonstrating your prescience. My next post will discuss the effects that the exploding population has on climate change, and it will also look at the other side of population control, namely, population collapse. Take for example the Japanese, they are now approaching two workers for each retired person! That doesn't sound good. Be sure to read the next post.
It is hard to comprehend timelines of the magnitude of Geologic time scales, eons, and even epochs. Here is a slightly humorous yet scary visualization of a mere 21000 years, from xkcd, which has stuck in my mind since they first published it - https://xkcd.com/1732/
And I do agree that something must be done about the population. Though I have doubts whether we be successful before something catastrophic reduces our population for us, as your Volcanoes, etc post points out are possibilities that have happened, and will happen again.
Erin,
Thanks for the comment. The graph/chart is very informative. Our lives are quite short when viewed in geologic time frames. The Anthropocene Epoch won't end in a couple of generations. The changes we have put in place will linger for a very long time — CO2, once introduced into the atmosphere will stay there for 300 to 1,000 years. It's hard to predict what the future will look like, but it will be warmer, it will be more crowed, and probably a lot less pleasant than the lives we have been privileged to live.
Robert
Hello Robert, and thanks for this post. I've heard the term Anthropocene Epoch before, but did not realize it's so widely recognized! Maybe that's a good thing in some way; maybe it will help us all be aware of our very large "footprint" on the Earth. Call me Pollyanna but I've always believed that a full awareness of a situation, even if the news is very bad, is absolutely necessary in taking steps to solve it.
The question of population, and the Earth's carrying capacity, is a welcome one to me anyway. It's quite a hot-button issue though everywhere. To me it's obvious that we need to limit our numbers but it quickly turns into accusations of elitism and even genocide. That's a tough one! There are all of those demographic facts about how populations tend to taper off once living standards rise, but I personally feel we've run out of time for that to happen; we need to be more pro-active.
Kathy,
Thanks for your comment. Population explosion is one of the problems that will make controlling climate change quite difficult. Even if we halted population growth today, we are faced with the fact that 2 to 3 billion existing people want a better life — and that means we need more energy production to provide the stuff that the underprivileged want.
Alternatively, those that have a lot of stuff, might be required to have less stuff. (Now there is a controversial solution.)