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Open Questions

Should the Anthropocene Be Formally Ratified as a Geological Epoch?

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Facts
Why Open
In 2024, after fifteen years of deliberation, the International Commission on Stratigraphy's Subcommission on Quaternary Stratigraphy voted down the Anthropocene Working Group's proposal to formally ratify the Anthropocene as a new epoch, owing largely to its shallow sedimentary record and its extremely recent, contested proposed start date, so the term remains widely used without a ratified place on the geologic time scale. 1
What Would Resolve
A revised formal proposal addressing the 2024 objections, most likely with a different candidate start marker less exposed to the recency-bias criticism levelled at the 1950 Great Acceleration boundary, brought back to the International Commission on Stratigraphy and the International Union of Geological Sciences for a fresh vote, would resolve the question either way. 1
Discipline Needed
Geochronology 1
Open Question

In 2024, after fifteen years of deliberation, the International Commission on Stratigraphy's Subcommission on Quaternary Stratigraphy voted down the Anthropocene Working Group's proposal to formally ratify the Anthropocene as a new epoch, owing largely to its shallow sedimentary record and its extremely recent, contested proposed start date, so the term remains widely used without a ratified place on the geologic time scale.

What would resolve this A revised formal proposal addressing the 2024 objections, most likely with a different candidate start marker less exposed to the recency-bias criticism levelled at the 1950 Great Acceleration boundary, brought back to the International Commission on Stratigraphy and the International Union of Geological Sciences for a fresh vote, would resolve the question either way.
OpenGeochronologyAnthropocene (Wikipedia)
Cross-Tradition Connections

Question On

Anthropocene, Concepts
Source Anthropocene (Wikipedia)
Sources
1. Anthropocene (Wikipedia)
Wikimedia FoundationRejection in 2024View the Source
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