[U-04] Environments of the Anthropocene: Natural Diversity and Resilience Perspective

[U04-04] Anthropocene, the homogenization of the planet, and the importance of natural diversity: Insights from mountains and geological time

★Invited Papers

*Abhik Chakraborty¹ (1.Wakayama University )

Keywords:Anthropocene transition, Earth system dynamics, Geological time , Mountain environments , Homogenization , Natural diversity

The Anthropocene is a shorthand for earth system transition during the past hundred years, with an emerging concensus on a globally synchronous starting date at the middle of the 20th century. Major biogeochemical cycles have been altered due to human influence and several key earth processes have been tipped into territories beyond their natural parameters. This emergence of the homo sapiens as an earth system agent requires understanding of some complex issues that are concerned with the earth as a planet but at the same time transcend earth science or gelogical disciplines. For example; the Anthropocene simultanepusly denotes a 'rupture' (i.e. from the Holocene) but a 'continuity' (i.e. within the larger chunks of geological time such as the Cenozoic and the Quaternary). This in turn would require appreciation of geological time and positioning the ongoing transformation within it. Two other related issues are: a species level impact, and a rapidly intensifying homogenization of the surface level diversity of the planet represented by landform/landscape heterogeneity, biodiversity, and their mutual interactions. This brief talk will be an endeavor to link these issues with changes in mountain landscapes--notably the ongoing but yet poorly understood alteration of disequilibrium states (dynamic surface process regimes) into further but a qualitatively different disequilibrium engendered by anthropogenic input. The talk will also present the argument that while climate change effects on the mountains (cryospehric processes) are usually highlighted, an equally important aspect is the fragmentation of mountain geodiversity, biodiversity, and their mutual linkages--which occur through the seemingly innocuous imprints such as provision of roads, hydrological engineering of mountain water conduits, and can be furthered through the increasing footprint of human visitation of these landscapes. It will be posited, that against this backdrop, we urgently need an appraisal of the natural diversity engendered through earth processes and their continued importance for the wellbeing of the planet.