The Anthropocene, viewed as the period where human activity has been the dominant influence on climate and the environment, is an important epoch, and I would accept adding this new epoch to the geological calendar. According to Malm, this epoch is accepted by many, and it should be accepted because the human-driven changes is causing concerns about the environment and the future of the Earth.
When the epoch should begin is a good question. According to Steffen, it should begin around 1800 with the start of the industrialization in the use of fossil fuels (Steffen, page 1).
“The mastery of fire by our ancestors provided humankind with a powerful monopolistic tool unavailable to other species, that put us firmly on the long path towards the Anthropocene” (Malm, page 1). According to this quote, the mastery of fire by our ancestors already started the Anthropocene, but according to both Kolbert and Steffen, the Anthropocene really began with the start of the industrialization.
I certainly agree with this timeline. During the industrialization the use of fossil fuels increased, first coal and then oil and gas (Steffen, page 4). According to the Kolbert reading the beginning of the Anthropocene can also be put in the middle of the 20th century following population growth and how consumption accelerated rapidly (Kolbert, page 4). I do not agree with this timeline because these two aspects were a result of the industrialization.
Dan Kahan argues that people make decisions based on what stands their cultural group has. This affects our ability to develop solutions to remediate climate change in the way that the ones who are the most proficient at technical reasoning, are also the most culturally polarized (Kahan, paragraph 4). Kahan mentions that positions on climate change have come to signify the kind of person one is (Kahan, paragraph 8), so whether or not you are a professional on the subject, your cultural values and beliefs still affects your opinion. Dr. Cathy Whitlock addresses this problem when discussing climate change with Montanans by focusing on small scale temperature change, to show the more personal climate change and finding local solutions. This is a good way to make people understand the seriousness of the topic. Providing evidence that climate change is a serious topic could also work to encourage conversations between different people with different beliefs about climate change. People have to see and understand how serious of a problem this is, and that cultural opinions are not as important in this case as facts are.