GEOG 3020 09_12 Reading Notes

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University of Guelph *

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3020

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Geography

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Oct 30, 2023

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GEOG 3020 09/12 Reading Notes Our Future in the Anthropocene Biosphere ● Future decisions made by humanity will shape the biosphere in positive or negative ways ● The most prevalent challenge we face is maintaining a sustainable and habitable biosphere ● People and nature are deeply intertwined ● Climate change and biodiversity loss is being exacerbated and accelerated by the intervention of human activity ● We’re in a critical period where we need the biosphere to be as strong as possible, but the opposite is occurring ● It is more imperative now than ever to begin regenerating the condition of our biosphere to sustain societal development ● In order to do so, mobilization, innovation, and social change is necessary ● Earth, as we know it, is the only planet in our solar system with a biosphere ● The thickness of the biosphere is approximately 20km ● The biosphere combines all living things, their diversity, and their relationships ● Earth systems include: biosphere, lithosphere, cryosphere, and the climate system ● Water, carbon, nitrogen, etc are essential for all life on Earth ● The biosphere has existed for ~3-5 billion years ● Modern humans have experienced only ~250 000 years ● Humans and the biosphere have coevolved, the most significant changes were during their genesis ● Mostly during the 1950s, human activity surged in development due to discovery of fossil energy ● Over the last century, human life expectancy has increased drastically, creating new social and environmental challenges ● The Anthropocene, a new geological epoch, is now recognized in the Earth’s timeline (Geological Time Scale) ● >75% of Earth’s ice-free land has been directly altered by humans ● Global warming has caused oxygen levels to decrease in the Earth’s oceans, starting around mid-20th century ● Further alteration of the biosphere comes from humans altering the evolution of many species through artificial selection ● ~55% of humans live in urban areas ● Urbanization has lead to higher consumption rates and changes in natural habitats ● Developments in research have concluded that urban areas accelerate evolution in species that are involved in the function of communities and ecosystems ● Due to man-made global warming, many of the Earth’s ecosystem capacities have been massively altered, by increasing the amount of CO2 stored by ~50% ● Additionally, large amounts of greenhouse gasses are being stored in soil and peatlands, compounding the issue further ● Currently, Earth faces estimates of ~1.2 degrees in temperature increases ● The Holocene (~15 000 years ago), has shown the highest mean temperature difference out of all recorded time periods

● It is predicted that in the next 50 years 1-3 billion people will experience different climate conditions than the ones that have existed for the last 6000 years ● ~55% of all anthropogenic carbon emissions are derived from the energy production that powers buildings and transport ● The remaining 45% come from the production of human goods and services (food, vehicles, electronics, clothing, etc) ● During the pandemic, carbon emissions had decreased by ~7% compared to 2019 ● The climate crisis has dramatically increased the frequency of natural disasters occuring around the world ● The probability of wildfires in Australia has increased by 30% ● The combination of a post COVID-19 world and the ever increasing climate risks result in global economy and food production suffering ●

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