Why the Anthropocene Epoch is a more pertinent concept than the Anthropocene event for understanding ongoing Earth system transition

Abstract

While the Anthropocene Working Group proposed in 2023 to formally recognize the Anthropocene Epoch with a lower boundary ~1950, the International Commission on Stratigraphy subsequently decided to reject the proposal. Instead, some scientists have argued, the Anthropocene is better understood as an ‘event’ with no temporal boundary. This article argues that the Anthropocene as an event idea is deeply problematic due to four major logical issues: (i) the heterogeneous term ‘event’ fails to provide clarity; (ii) the ‘-cene’ suffix is used consistently for epoch-level units of the Quaternary, so a temporally diffuse impact should be described with an altogether different term; (iii) it is misleading to put Earth system change caused by myriad organisms in the past on par with the impact of Homo sapiens (a single species) and (iv) a temporally diffuse event fails to address the qualitatively different nature of the Earth system change during the Great Acceleration.