ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews the geological impact of humans set against past changes in the Earth system. It describes the problems associated with identifying a geological boundary for the Anthropocene that identifies the magnitude of human influence. The role of the Anthropocene Working Group is to examine evidence that the Anthropocene is a discrete unit of the Geological Time scale characterized by a stratigraphic record of humans as agents of global change, and most likely considered at the level of epoch. Urban centres are potential fossil structures in the making, recording – likely for geological timescales – the complexity of modern human society. The first proposals of the Anthropocene by Paul Crutzen and Eugene Stoermer linked its beginning with the Industrial Revolution, around the beginning of the nineteenth century, following the invention of James Watt's steam engine. A possible new epoch of geological time characterized by humans is being analysed by the Anthropocene Working Group.
