, 2007 and Steffen et al., 2011) suggested that AD 1800, roughly the start of the Industrial Revolution in Europe, be considered as the beginning of the Anthropocene. Others have taken a longer view, especially Ruddiman, 2003, AC220 ic50 Ruddiman, 2005 and Ruddiman, 2013, who argued that greenhouse gas concentrations, deforestation, soil erosion, plant and animal extinctions, and associated climate changes all accelerated at least 8000 years ago with wide-scale global farming (see also Smith and Zeder, 2014). Doughtry et al. (2010) suggested that the Anthropocene should be pushed back to 14,000 or 15,000

years ago, eliminating the Holocene, and correlating with the extinction of Pleistocene megafauna and the associated climate changes brought on by these events. At the other end of the spectrum, some scholars argue for a starting date of AD 1950, based on changes in riverine fluxes (Maybeck and Vörösmarty, 2005) or the appearance of artificial radionucliotides resulting from atomic detonations (Crutzen and Steffen, 2003). In 2008, a proposal

for the formal designation of the Anthropocene was presented to the Stratigraphy Commission of the Geological Society of London (Zalasiewicz et al., 2008). An Anthropocene Working Group, part of the Subcommission on Quaternary Stratigraphy, has been formed to learn more help determine if the Anthropocene will be formally accepted into the Geological Time Scale and when it began (Zalasiewicz et al., 2010,

p. 2228). In line with Crutzen’s arguments, the proposal suggests a genesis at the dawn of the Industrial Revolution or the nuclear era of the 1950s. Ultimately, any date chosen for the beginning of the Anthropocene is likely to be relatively arbitrary and controversial, a point at which scientists can logically argue that we have moved from a planet dominated by natural processes into one dominated by anthropogenic forces. No single date can do justice, moreover, to the long process of human geographic expansion, technological Sinomenine development, and economic change that led up to the Industrial Revolution, the nuclear age, or any other singular hallmark in planetary history. As demonstrated by the papers in this issue, archeology—the study of material remains left behind by past human cultures—has much to contribute to understanding the deep history of human impacts on earth’s landscapes and ecosystems. From the controversial and often polarized debates about the history of anthropogenically driven extinctions, to the origins and spread of agricultural and pastoral societies, the effects of humans on marine fisheries and coastal ecosystems, to the acceleration of colonialism and globalization, archeological records can be utilized by scholars to understand not just when humans dominated earth’s ecosystems, but the processes that led to such domination.