Lecture 3 – Living in the Anthropocene

Question 1

How long was the holocene?

Answer 1

11,700 years

Question 2

What is the signature of the Anthropocene?

Answer 2

Human impacts

Question 3

What are the fears in the Anthropocene?

Answer 3

passing thresholds in the Earth system (e.g. the climate tipping point)

Question 4

When was the Anthropocene Working Group Setup?

Answer 4

2009

Question 5

What was the goal of the Anthropocene Working Group?

Answer 5

proving we’ve left the Holocene behind and entered the Anthropocene

Question 6

What date did the Anthropocene Working Group vote on for the start of the Anthropocene?

Answer 6

Mid 20th Century

Question 7

What can we do by bring together geological and Earth System Science?

Answer 7

View the Earth as a single unified system

Question 8

By viewing the Earth as a single unified system what have we learnt?

Answer 8

that it is changeable (with or without human impact) and can exist in different states overtime.

Question 9

What could be said about the different periods of Earth history?

Answer 9

The Earth is actually a number of different Earths – that have succeeded each other in time, each with different chemical physical and biological states

Question 10

What does the planetary boundaries idea put forward?

Answer 10

That there is all sorts of aspects in the Earth system that might pass a tipping point, pushing the Earth into a different operating states

Question 11

What do we know for sure about the Holocene, but potentially not other eons

Answer 11

It is the only state of the Earth system that we know for certain can support contemporary human societies

Question 12

What period of time do social scientists typically focus on?

Answer 12

On a tiny (relative) section of the Earth’s life, only the most recent

Question 13

Why should social scientists be interested in the Anthropocene?

Answer 13

Its about changes triggered by humans, and they are specialists in human activity
The Anthropocene can’t be left to natural scientists. It’s a social problem, and needs social science
Society remains fundamentally dependent on changeable Earth processes

Question 14

What is the problem with grand environmental claims?

Answer 14

They suggest that there is only one way to view or understand the Earth, and only one group have all the knowledge

Question 15

What happens to rights and freedoms in states of emergencies?

Answer 15

They’re heavily limited

Question 16

What political system is usually favoured in states of emergency?

Answer 16

Democratic decision making is often suspended in favour of authoritarian, top-down rule

Question 17

What happened after Hurricane Katrina?

Answer 17

The military took control

Question 18

When was Hurricane Katrina?

Answer 18

2005

Question 19

What was the problem with the military taking over after Hurricane Katrina?

Answer 19

the military taking control took priority over caring for people, helping them and seeing that they had their needs met

Question 20

What is the problem with Authoritarian control?

Answer 20

People’s lives and looking after ordinary people comes second

Question 21

What decision do social scientist’s fear governments would make if a climate state of emergency was declared?

Answer 21

Regimes could make the decision that it’s to late to save the planet politically, and instead turn towards attempting to engineer the entire global climate

Question 22

What do indigenous scholars argue that climate change and the Anthropocene is a result of?

Answer 22

colonial exploitation coming back to the West

Question 23

What have indigenous people already lived through?

Answer 23

destructions of ecosystems, homes and their way of life, arguably they have lived through what we would describe as ‘the end of the world’

Question 24

What is happening to the relationship between social and natural science, and where will it end?

Answer 24

It is shifting, but it is too soon to say where it’ll end up

Question 25

What is happening to the relationship between Western thought and other ways of thinking about the Earth and where will it end?

Answer 25

It is shifting, and we don’t know where it’ll end up.

Question 26

Has the word Anthropocene been defined officially?

Answer 26

No

Question 27

How have all previous eras, periods and epochs been defined?

Answer 27

By comparing one set of rock strata with another

Question 28

What is different about the Anthropocene compared to previous eras?

Answer 28

We are (formally or informally) living within it, and are able to observe many different characteristics (landscape, biodiversity, atmospheric composition, etc)

Question 29

Can geologists alone define the Anthropocene?

Answer 29

No, we must use botanists, zoologists, atmospheric, and ocean scientists as well as geologists.

Question 30

What does the Anthropocene represent, and what does this mean?

Answer 30

A new phase in the history of both humankind and of the Earth, when natural forces and human forces became intertwined, so that the fate of one determines the fate of the other.