Editorialising headline:
A new force of nature is reshaping the planet, study finds
From the RSP opinion piece (not a study,) emphasis mine:
However, this coupling of socially produced environmental challenges with disruptive social changes—the Anthropocene condition—is not new.
Yes, we live in the Anthropocene. Yes, in geological terms human effects on the environment are new. But as the source also says, “new” in that context is still thousands of years old:
Global climate change, biodiversity losses and other anthropogenic planetary changes all began long before the industrial age
Plus, as is quoted in the OP:
Human sociocultural capabilities to engineer ecosystems, from using fire to clear land, to propagating favoured species, to agriculture, to industrial food systems, have evolved and accumulated over millennia
Anthroecology is the more novel concept here, and an interesting approach, too. But that is all it is — there is no “new force of nature” at play, only a recent framework to better understand and (hopefully) manage our detrimental effects on the world around us.
I was in a physical meeting where the other part cracked open their Windows laptop so we could go over documents together. Halfway in I noticed the microphone icon was on in the system bar.
Considering Microsoft and the state of Windows, I’m guessing the entire conversation is liable to be used as training data, and I would really have liked the option to nope the hell out in advance.