The Plastic Age of Man

Typical isn't it?

You just get used to the idea of one Geological Epoch and another one begins.

By that terminology I mean the determination of an era in the history of Planet Earth from the evidence held in its rock layers.

Within the estimated 4.57 billion years of the existence of this Third Rock from our Sun there have, of course, been other Epochs.

These should not be confused with the arguably better known geological periods such as Cambrian, Silurian, Devonian, my favourite the Carboniferous Mississipian, Permian and perhaps the most referred to of Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous. It is important to define an Epoch as a sub division within these.

We are broadly familiar with the last three of these as mentioned from our fascination with dinosaurs, the first birds and the emergence of flora species.

The extinction of those terrible lizards is though to have taken place around 65 million years ago in the Paleocene Epoch followed by the what was called the age of mammals.

It was not until the Pleistocene Epoch that humans developed and before you know it we reach the Epoch of the current age- the Holocene.

The Holocene Epoch actually began only around 11,500 years ago amidst an Ice Age which technically we are still in.

The duration of an Epoch has tended to be over several million years but those in the know are advocating that we are already in fact on the cusp of the next one- the Anthropocene- or "Era of New Man".

It is not however to be an indication of Enlightenment, an Egalitarian or Eutopian age for Mankind but in fact a veiled warning of the unprecedented changes imposed by humans on the ecosystems and environment in more recent times, in effect pinpointed from the start of the Industrial Revolution in Western Europe around 250 years ago.

In much the same way as natural events such a meteor strikes, floods, glacial activity, volcanic cataclysms and earthquakes laid down strata and sediments for subsequent analysis and dating by current era Scientists our own modern lifestyle, industrial processes and emissions threaten to leave an indelible mark on the planet which will certainly present a stark picture to those following on in the distant future.

This can already be seen in the destruction of habitats, degrading of soil, residues from pollution, the extinction of animals and plants, discharges of fossil fuels, radiation from such events as the Atomic bombs in 1945 and Chernobyl in 1986 and very topically the debris from single use and other plastics.

I can relax a bit in that the debate over the actual transition period from Holocene to Anthropocene is still ongoing and a common consensus may not be reached for another decade.

I just hope that even this microscopic amount of time of 10 years, when compared to the age of the Planet, will not irrevocably delay the taking of definitive global action to mitigate the worst excesses of the new Epoch on Humankind.