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The Anthropocene Working Group is voting on a so-called Golden Spike, a sedimentary layer somewhere on Earth that best exemplifies the global impact of humans on planet Earth. It's the last, big task in formally defining the Anthropocene, which is being proposed as a new age in geologic time.
Japanese researchers hope that a new geologic epoch covering the present time will be named after Beppu Bay in western Japan, a second such example following the Chibanian Age.
Geologists are in a hot debate about whether to call for the end of the Holocene Epoch of the the Quaternary Period of the Cenozoic Era of the Phanerozoic Eon. At issue is whether to declare the beginning of the Anthropocene Epoch -i.e. the Epoch of human caused change to the earth. On the one hand: «Stanley C. Finney, the secretary general of the International Union of
On August 29, 2016, the Anthropocene Working Group recommended that the Anthropocene Epoch be made an official geologic unit.