Researchers collecting a sediment core sample from Crawford Lake, Canada
Bonnie Jo Mount/The Washington Post via Getty Images
The long-standing effort to formally place the Anthropocene on the geologic time scale came to a surprising end this year. In March, the academic jury rejected the proposal to define a new era 12 to 4 votes. However, for the group behind the proposal, work continues to define the term, which highlights the rapid changes humans have caused on Earth.
The Holocene, which began about 11,700 years ago, continues today. It generally covers a period of planetary stability…
